# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
By Leslie Morrison, CTD Summer Leapfrog Coordinator

Graphic novels have become a popular format in classrooms, partly due to their appeal to reluctant readers. More recently, a growing body of research, focused on how the brain processes the combination of images and text, indicates that graphic novels are also excellent resources for advanced learners.

When students read visual narratives, the activity in the brain is similar to how readers comprehend text-based sentences. However, when students learn to read graphic novels with an analytical eye, depth and complexity are added to the reading process.

With graphic novels, students use text and images to make inferences and synthesize information, both of which are abstract and challenging skills for readers. Images, just like text, can be interpreted in many different ways, and can bring nuances to the meaning of the story. In this form of literature, the images and the text are of equal importance -the text would not fully make sense without the images, and the reverse is true as well.

Graphic novels can also challenge students to think deeply about the elements of storytelling. In a traditional text, students uncover meaning embedded in sentences and paragraphs. In graphic texts, students must analyze the images, looking for signs of character development, for example, or clues that help build plot. All of this experience developing textual and visual reading skills contribute to students' understanding of their world - the ways the text and images all around them communicate - and in turn help them in crafting their own stories.
Resources
Barbee, M. Comic Books as Models for Literacy Instruction. International Reading Association. 2015.

Brenna, B. How Graphic Novels Support Reading Comprehension Strategy Development in Children. Wiley-Blackwell. Literacy Journal, UKLA, pp.88- 94. 2012.
Brown, Sally. A Blended Approach to Reading and Writing Graphic Stories. Wiley Online Library. 2013.
Bucher, K., & Manning, M. Bringing Graphic Novels into a School's Curriculum. The Clearing House, November / December 2004.

Cohn, Neil. The Visual Language of Comics: Introduction to the Structure and Cognition of Sequential Images. London: Bloomsbury. 2013.
Eisner, W. Graphic Storytelling and Visual Narrative. W.W. Norton & Company. 2008.
Gillenwater, C. Graphic Novels in Advanced English / Language Arts Classrooms: A Phenomenological Case Study. Dissertation, Doctor of Philosophy in the School of Education, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. 2012.

McCloud, S. Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art. William Morrow Paperbacks. 1994.
Comic in the Classroom: Why Comics?
The Impact of Structures and Meaning on Sequential Image Comprehension

Neil Cohn, Martin Paczinski, Phil Holcomb, Ray Jackendoff, Gina Kuperberg,

-Tufts University
http://www.visuallanguagelab.com/P/NC_pn&b_abstract.pdf

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
The Research Behind Graphic Novels and Young Learners

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
By Leslie Morrison, CTD Summer Leapfrog Coordinator Graphic novels have become a popular format in classrooms, partly due to their appeal to reluctant readers. More recently, a growing body of research, focused on how the brain processes the combination of images and text, indicates that graphic novels are also excellent resources for advanced learners.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
In recent years, graphic novels have exploded in popularity. They are everywhere. And kids are excited about reading them. When I look at the circulation statistics in my K-5 library, graphic novels are some of the most checked out titles. El Deafo, Star Wars: Jedi Academy, Smile, and The Flying Beaver Brothers and the Evil Penguin Plan are just a few that fly off the shelves on a regular basis. Roller Girl, a 2016 Newbery Honor Book, is another one. Based on this information, one would think that educators and parents would be wholly supportive of their students and children reading these books. Unfortunately, that is not always the case.
The Truth Behind Graphic Novels
Many parents and educators view graphic novels as glorified comic strips. They don't believe that these books are quality pieces of literature. I've had students tell me that their parents won't let them read graphic novels because they're "not real books." I've also had classroom teachers encourage their students to select "real books" and not graphic novels when they visit the school library. For all of the nay-sayers, I'd like to set the record straight. Graphic novels are REAL BOOKS. They are full length stories told in paneled, sequential, graphic format. They are NOT simply collections of comic strips. Many genres are written in graphic novel format, including fantasy, realistic fiction, historical fiction, biography, and nonfiction. They are NOT all about superheroes, nor do they all include scantily clad characters.
Creating Lifelong Readers
Graphic novels promote literacy in a variety of ways. They attract and motivate kids to read. The same titles can appeal to both reluctant and advanced readers. The illustrations provide struggling readers and ESL students with contextual clues to access the meaning of the written text. Graphic novels can offer students opportunities to read about diverse characters. As a school librarian, I want to help each of my students find a book they will love. For a variety of reasons, some students can't get excited about picture books, chapter books, novels, or poetry. However, these students may fall in love with reading if they're introduced to graphic novels. We owe it to our students to help them discover the joy of reading.
Choosing the Right Graphic Novels for Your Collections
There are many resources available to help you select the best graphic novels for your collections. The ALA's Association for Library Service to Children has compiled recommended reading lists of graphic novels, broken up by age level.

Here are some other graphic novels that are worth checking out.

I was recently awarded a grant by the Southington American Legion Auxiliary to purchase 50 new graphic novels for my library. My students were thrilled when I shared this news with them. I'm hoping this grant will shine a light on the importance of graphic novels and help the entire school community recognize the value they bring to our collection.

What have your experiences been with parents, educators, and graphic novels?

Categories: Blog Topics, Collection Development, Community/Teacher Collaboration

Tags: graphic novels

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
"But that's not a real book!" - Why Your Collections Should Include Graphic Novels | Knowledge Quest

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
In recent years, graphic novels have exploded in popularity. They are everywhere. And kids are excited about reading them. When I look at the circulation statistics in my K-5 library, graphic novels are some of the most checked out titles.... Read More ›

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
To all politicians, business leaders, town leaders, school board members and everyone else who thinks they now really know about teaching and learning because kids have been at home for a full five months (heavens!):

When you say or hear someone say, "You must reopen the schools," remind them that they left out one word. Only one word. But that one word might be the difference between one child living or not; one teacher living or not; one parent at home living or not. One cafeteria worker, one bus driver, one custodian, one librarian, one secretary, one administrator living or not. One word could save one life and maybe that life is the life of someone you love:

"We must reopen the schools SAFELY."

This does not mean Trump should say that the CDC guidelines are too hard or too stringent and so let's make those guidelines easier.

Easier is not safely.
Faster is not safely.

Do we all want schools re-opened? Yes! But we must re-open schools SAFELY.

That's the missing word.

Parents - as you worry about what will happen next, here's a tip: If your school board won't meet face-to-face to discuss reopening because it's not safe for them, then it's not safe for the kids and teachers to be meeting face- to-face. If your office isn't sending all back to work, then kids shouldn't be headed back to school. If restaurants can't run at full capacity, then schools can't either.

And school board members: If your list of ideas includes suggestions such as "Teachers can open a window" or "They can take kids outside to learn" then please follow your own advice. I invite your school board to sit outside at 11:00 a.m. for an hour on the ground, or better yet, the parking lot since many schools do not have multiple tree-shaded spaces. Take up business there for an hour. Now, do it for four more hours.

How dare any school board members sit in their air-conditioned, leather-chaired board rooms and discuss what a teacher in a portable building should be able to do; a teacher in a building so old that windows have been painted shut; a teacher who must walk up three flights of stairs - as will the students - to get to a classroom; a teacher who will have crying children in the classroom because Todd over there coughed and now they are scared. A teacher who wants to lean-in to listen intently as that shy middle-schooler reads aloud something he wrote but that can't happen. A teacher who teaches teens who are ripping off masks every time the teacher looks away.

Maybe your solution is to put 100 kids in the school gym spread throughout the gym floor and up on bleachers. Nice. They'll be socially distanced. Go there, dear school board members. Each of you invite 10 or so friends to come join you - some might show up - to sit in all those other spaces. Require all sit facing the same way and then let discussions begin. How long before you give up listening because the gym isn't designed to be conducive to learning? More importantly, would ten of your friends join you in the gym? Or, have you ever visited a school cafeteria during lunch? I have. Many times. Even if you put kids in the four corners and keep them six-feet apart from one another, you still can't hear. Don't suggest something you haven't tried. Please, just don't.

How dare school board members make decisions without sitting in the worst classrooms of their poorest buildings for the day. They must walk the walk of a teacher before offering decisions. Any decisions regarding the reopening of schools that have been made by people who have only been sitting in the comfort of their homes talking via Zoom or the comfort of a spacious board room are uninformed decisions at best and dangerous decisions at worst.

So, dear businessmen and ladies, dear retired members of the community, dear working members of the community without children, or parents still working hard in your homes and in your community - all of you who sit on our school boards, take yourself into one of those classrooms for six hours and sit, wearing a mask, not turning around, not passing a sheet of paper to another board member, not being able to hear someone because of the mask or hear the teacher because of the mask or be heard because of the mask; remember you can't go to the bathroom when you need to because it's not your time; and bring your sandwich. Stop that turning around! I saw you - even though all you wanted to do was ask if you could borrow a pencil. Oh, right. No pencil borrowing. And, no, no-one can come close to you to check your work or help you with a problem. You just sit there, alone. Dear board members, from that setting under those circumstances, after you have heard from many teachers, then you can make critical decisions about reopening schools SAFELY. Oh, if someone coughs, open the window. That will make it all better.

Sincerely,
Dr. Kylene Beers
Teacher

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
To all politicians, business leaders, town leaders, school board members and everyone else who thinks they now really know about teaching and learning because kids have been at home for a full five months (heavens!): When you say or hear someone say, "You must reopen the schools," remind them that they left out one word.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Donalyn Miller is an award-winning teacher, author, and staff development leader who has taught fourth, fifth, and sixth grade language arts and social studies in the Fort Worth, Texas area. Her teaching awards include TCTELA's Elementary Language Arts Teacher of the Year (2011), Keller ISD Elementary Teacher of the Year (2010), ESC Region XI Teacher of the Year (2010), TEA State Finalist Texas Elementary Teacher of the Year (2010), Trinity Meadows Intermediate School Teacher of the Year (2010), and Texas Association for the Gifted and Talented Region XI Rising Star Teacher (2008). In 2018, Donalyn was awarded TCTELA's Edmund J. Farrell Distinguished Lifetime Achievement Award for her contributions to the language arts teaching profession.

Donalyn is the author or co-author of several books about creating engaging and inclusive reading communities for all children. In her first book, The Book Whisperer (Jossey-Bass, 2009), Donalyn reflects on her journey to become a reading teacher and describes how she inspires and motivates her middle school students to read 40 or more books a year. In a starred review, Library Journal said, "Her approach is simple yet provocative: affirm the reader in every student, allow students to choose their own books, carve out extra reading time, model authentic reading behaviors, discard timeworn reading assignments such as book reports and comprehension worksheets, and develop a classroom library filled with high-interest books." The Book Whisperer has been translated into several languages including French and Chinese.

In her second book, Reading in the Wild (Jossey-Bass, 2013), Donalyn collected survey responses from over 900 adult readers about their reading habits and used this information to explicitly model and teach lifelong reading habits to her students. Donalyn's articles about teaching and reading have appeared in publications such as Gifted Child International, Education Week Teacher, The Reading Teacher, Voices From the Middle, Educational Leadership, Horn Book, and The Washington Post. Donalyn is currently working on a new book with Dr. Teri Lesesne, and has several solo and collaborative writing projects planned for 2018 and 2019.

With her friend and collaborator Colby Sharp, Donalyn co-founded The Nerdy Book Club blog, which provides daily inspiration, book recommendations, resources, and advice about raising and teaching young readers. Since the blog began in 2011, Nerdy Book Club has grown into a podcast, numerous state and national conference presentations, and several Ed Camp-style professional development events including Nerd Camp Michigan and Nerd Camp, Jr. held annually in Parma, Michigan.

Donalyn is the founder of the annual summer #bookaday challenge and co-hosts (along with Colby Sharp) the monthly Twitter chat #titletalk, a monthly chat about reading and books.

From 2014 to 2019, Donalyn served as Scholastic Book Fairs' Ambassador of Independent Reading Advocacy. In this role, Donalyn traveled to conferences and schools as a reading ambassador, sat on several Scholastic advisory boards, and hosted the web-based teaching tips and book talk show- The Book Whisperer: Back to the Books. With her colleague and friend, John Schumacher, Donalyn co-edited the Reader Leader blog and co-hosted Scholastic Book Fairs' annual Reading Summits.

Through her international conference presentations, workshops, school visits, published works, and online collaborations with colleagues, Donalyn shares the importance of self-selected independent reading and provides suggestions and resources that foster children's love of reading and the development of positive reading identities. Presentations include current and timeless research, classroom rituals and routines that support engaging reading communities, classroom and home library development, book recommendations, practical reading and writing workshop strategies and instructional moves, and personal stories about the power of independent reading and student choice.

Donalyn and her husband, Don, have two grown daughters and three grandchildren. They live in Colleyville, Texas in a house full of bookcases.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Donalyn Miller is an award-winning teacher, author, and staff development leader who has taught fourth, fifth, and sixth grade language arts and social studies in the Fort Worth, Texas area. Her teaching awards include TCTELA's Elementary Language Arts Teacher of the Year (2011), Keller ISD Elementary Teacher of the Year (2010), ESC Region XI Teacher...

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Katherine Sokolowski

I teach seventh grade and have been teaching for the past nineteen years. I love reading and writing in my classroom. I am using this as a space to reflect on my teaching and hope you will join in.

View my complete profile

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Katherine Sokolowski I teach seventh grade and have been teaching for the past nineteen years. I love reading and writing in my classroom. I am using this as a space to reflect on my teaching and hope you will join in. View my complete profile

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Jillian Heise {Hi-Z} is a National Board Certified Teacher with one Masters degree in Reading/Language Arts + another Masters in Library & Information Science. She has been an elementary Library Media Specialist in southeastern Wisconsin since 2017. Prior to that, she taught 7th & 8th grade ELA in the Milwaukee area for eleven years with an additional year out of the classroom as a literacy consultant. As founder of #ClassroomBookADay (inspired by Donalyn Miller's #bookaday) in 2014, Jillian is a passionate advocate for the power of shared stories to build classroom and school community and engagement. She dedicates her practice to ... read more

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
A School Librarian Sharing Books & #ClassroomBookADay

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Don't be afraid to set high goals. You will be pleasantly surprised when you see how excited the kids get as the picture gets colored in. This visual works for us as a class. Do what works for your students.

# data[].attributes.headline
Volunteer State Book Awards nominee list for 2018-2019

# data[].attributes.subject
Volunteer State Book Awards nominee list for 2018-2019

# data[].attributes.body
February 1, 2019

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
March 2012 | Volume 69 | Number 6
Reading: The Core Skill Pages 58-62

Timothy Shanahan, Douglas Fisher and Nancy Frey

To help students learn to read complex texts, teachers need to answer the question, What do we mean when we say that a text is difficult? Readability formulas usually answer this question by measuring two factors: challenging vocabulary and long, complex sentences. Here we look at these factors along with several others that also affect readers' ability to comprehend text.

Vocabulary

If you ask students what makes reading hard, they blame the words. And they're right to place so much importance on vocabulary: Authors introduce their ideas through words and phrases, and if readers don't know what these mean, there's little chance that they will make sense of the text. Studies show that higher-order thinking in reading depends heavily on knowledge of word meanings.

Often, textbooks and teachers focus their attention on teaching students the vocabulary words that describe central concepts in science, history, mathematics, or literature. Domain-specific terms, such as erosion, Newton's third law of motion, rhombus, and metaphor, are sure to receive instructional emphasis in today's classrooms. However, these words are usually surrounded by other essential but more general academic terms, such as exerts, estimates, determines, distributed, resulting, culminates, and classify. These words, every bit as much as those in the first list, are used in particular ways in the various disciplines and warrant instructional attention. Students' ability to comprehend a piece of text depends on the number of unfamiliar domain-specific words and new general academic terms they encounter.

Sentence Structure

Words are not the whole picture. Sentence structure matters, too, because it determines how the words operate together. Thus, understanding the sentence "The stork was walking in the beautiful cornfield" requires more than just being able to define individual words. The sentence must also tell the reader how the ideas expressed by these words fit together (Which stork? Where was the stork? What was it doing?). If the text instead said, " Stork beautiful the walking in was the cornfield," all the same ideas would have been presented, yet readers would not understand the meaning.

Other aspects of sentence structure can determine how hard it is for readers to make sense of text. Shorter sentences, for example, tend to be easier to read than longer sentences; presumably, they put less demand on the reader's working memory. Longer sentences are likely to include multiple phrases or clauses, so they tend to include more ideas that have to be related to one another. They also have a greater density (longer noun or verb phrases) and more embedding (more complex relationships).

Authors construct such complicated sentences for a variety of reasons. In some cases, complex sentence structures are necessary to communicate the complexity of the information itself-thus the long noun phrases common in science. In literary passages, long-sentence writers like William Faulkner or Evelyn Waugh may be trying to get readers to slow down and explore the architecture of the thoughts and feelings being expressed. In attempting to convey emotional complexity, we might write a sentence like this:

The yellow snow blower that my father bought for my mother for their 15th wedding anniversary last year is now sitting in the garage, under a pile of old boxes and newspapers, where she left it that night, just before she threw her mobile phone, the one with my picture on it, at dad, and burst into tears.

The many layered phrases in this sentence express the complicated emotions connected with the events better than a series of shorter, clearer sentences would do. However, such sentences can be hard to untangle because of the demands they place on working memory: What happened just before the mother threw her phone? Who burst into tears? The verb phrase is so deeply embedded in this sentence that it can be hard, at first, to identify what is happening. If students are to interpret the meanings such complex sentence structures convey, they need to learn how to make sense of the conventions of text-phrasing, word order, punctuation, and language.

Coherence

Another challenge concerns how particular words, ideas, and sentences in text connect with one another, a feature referred to as coherence. Authors use pronouns, synonyms, ellipses, and other tools to connect the ideas across text. For example, take this simple passage:

John and Mary went to space camp. They liked it there. Of course, boys often like rockets, but Mary, too, enjoyed it.

The first sentence tells about something two children did. To make sense of the second sentence, the reader has to recognize that the pronoun they refers to the two children who were named in the first sentence and that there refers to space camp. Similarly, to interpret the third sentence, the reader has to link boys to John and recognize that it means the same thing as there did in the second sentence.

Younger students often have difficulty making such connections, especially if the ideas are far apart or the referents don't get restated frequently. Distant or complex cohesive links can also be challenging for second-language learners or for older students reading about an unfamiliar topic.

Organization

Ideas can be arranged across text in many ways, some more straightforward than others. For example, some kinds of text-such as a science experiment or a recipe-order events in a time sequence. This would also be true of some fiction or historical stories, but not all of them. You will most likely never see a writer play around with a time sequence in presenting a science experiment, but flashbacks in literature and nonsequential presentations of events in historical writing are common and important.

Other organizational structures include compare-contrast and problem-solution. For example, in science texts, detailed comparisons between species like alligators and crocodiles or between concepts like meiosis and mitosis are common. Similarly, problem-solution structures are evident in both science and social studies; for example, an essay might explain multiple causes of water pollution and then explore multiple solutions for each of these causes. Some organizational structures are used to organize particular text features; for example, a social studies textbook may include particular categories of detailed information (history, geography, economics, and culture) in each chapter.

Students who are aware of the patterns authors use to communicate complex information have an advantage in making sense of text. For example, it's easier to follow Moby Dick if you know that it is a narrative of a voyage punctuated by a series of digressions-that one chapter might move the story forward, followed by another that describes the anatomy of whales, the history of whaling, or a sermon that one might hear in a whaling-town church in the 19th century.

Background Knowledge

Vocabulary, sentence structure, coherence, and organization can all be determined by closely analyzing the text itself. A final determinant of text difficulty, however, depends on the reader's prior knowledge.

For example, Ernest Hemingway's The Old Man and the Sea is often recommended for use with adolescents. Hemingway's language is spare and plain; he uses common words, and his sentences are often short, without embedding or complexity. A text gradient analysis would place this text at a 6th grade reading level.

Yet many students at this age would have difficulty understanding this beautiful book. The reason is obviously not in the book itself but in the interaction between the reader and the book. Few preteens have had the emotional experiences that would prepare them to understand the old man's determination to maintain hope and dignity in the face of overwhelming odds. Students' background knowledge, including developmental, experiential, and cognitive factors, influences their ability to understand the explicit and inferential qualities of a text.

What Can Teachers Do About Text Complexity?

Knowledge of text complexity can help teachers design three important components of literacy instruction: building skills, establishing purpose, and fostering motivation.

Build Skills

Let's face it: Some students can't make sense of a complex text because they can't decode it. Any older student who still struggles with decoding needs intervention to address this difficulty.

But even students who have basic decoding skills sometimes struggle to deploy these skills easily and accurately enough to get a purchase on challenging text. To help these students develop reading fluency, teachers should give them lots of practice with reading the same text, as well as instruction to help them develop a stronger sense of where to pause in sentences, how to group words, and how their voices should rise or fall at various junctures when reading aloud.

Fluency instruction becomes more powerful when it's taught not as an end in itself, but rather in the context of students' attempts to make sense of a particular text. True fluency is not merely lining up one sentence after another and reading them aloud quickly; it's also maintaining understanding across a text. Therefore, fluency instruction should emphasize sentence structure and meaning. Teachers should have students pause to discuss the meaning of the text. They should pair repeated readings of the same text with questions that require the student to read closely for detail and key ideas.

Ongoing, solid vocabulary instruction is another essential component to help students develop skill in reading complex text. This instruction should focus not just on domain-specific words and phrases that describe the central concepts in the subject area, but also on general academic words. Effective vocabulary instruction usually provides a rich exploration of word meanings, in which students do more than just copy dictionary definitions-they consider synonyms, antonyms, categories, and specific examples for the words under study.

Students also explore the connections among words, considering other words in the same category, comparing and contrasting words with similar meanings, evaluating or constructing analogies, and building word webs. They also have opportunities to use the words in reading, writing, speaking, listening, drawing, and even physically acting them out. As students analyze the use of the vocabulary terms in text, teachers can guide them to think about the meanings that the authors intended to convey (for example, the differences in implication between nosey and curious, or cheap and frugal).

Establish Purpose

Recently, we were asked to explain why a passage about deserts was challenging for readers. As we started to read the text, we noticed its beautiful language, vivid imagery, and well-wrought descriptions. Despite its beauty, however, we found it hard to make sense of this passage. The problem was that we couldn't tell whether it was meant to be a literary text or a scientific one. Without knowing what kind of text we were reading or what we were expected to do with the information, we had no idea what to attend to.

Students often find themselves in this kind of bind. Younger children frequently encounter hybrid texts that combine a narrative story with expository information. For example, in the Magic School Bus books, the characters take field trips to learn about electricity, weather, dinosaurs, and other topics. When reading these books, children need to determine whether to focus on the story of the field trip or the information about the concepts. Until they figure it out, they may feel confused.

Older students are confronted with texts from science, history, mathematics, and literature; and they have to grasp the purposes for reading each of these texts so that they can focus their attention appropriately. For example, science texts focus heavily on causation. These texts convey information about what causes what, but they are not typically concerned with the intention behind these events. Students reading a science text may learn that apples grow on trees and that birds eat them, which plays an important role in spreading the seeds around, which creates even more apple trees; however, readers will not be expected to question whether apples grow on trees intentionally so that birds may eat them. In contrast, in reading history and literature, readers need to be concerned with not just the causes of events, but also the human intentions behind these causes.

In clearly communicating the purpose of reading to students, teachers should not convey so much information that it spoils the reading or enables students to participate in class without completing the reading; rather, they should let students know what learning to expect from the reading. For the text about deserts, for example, establishing the purpose, "Determine the difference between desert and tundra biomes" would direct the reading differently from establishing the purpose, "Examine the author's use of imagery and consider how you could apply it in your own writing." Although both of these purposes are worthwhile, reading for one purpose while performing a task for another would likely result in confusion and even failure. When students struggle to understand the task, they pay less attention to the text itself.

Over time, as students read with purpose, they develop background knowledge and a deeper understanding of the organizational structures authors use to convey information. This understanding gives students access to increasingly complex texts.

Foster Motivation and Persistence

Learning to read challenging text is similar to undergoing physical therapy. Initially, such therapy is often painful and exhausting, and it's tempting to cheat on the exercises a bit. Physical therapists have to focus not only on the muscle groups that need to be strengthened or stretched, but also on the patient's motivation. They need to keep the patient's head in the game, because working past the pain is beneficial.

Similarly, it can be tough for students to hang in there and stick with a text that they have to labor through, looking up words, puzzling over sentences, straining to make connections. Teachers may be tempted to try to make it easier for students by avoiding difficult texts. The problem is, easier work is less likely to make readers stronger. Teachers need to motivate students to keep trying, especially when the level of work is increasing. The payoff comes from staying on track.

A good physical therapist knows what good teachers know: You need to create successive successes. Students experience success in the company of their teacher, who combines complex texts with effective instruction. They apply their growing competence outside the company of their teacher by reading texts that match their independent reading ability. Over time, they engage in close reading of texts of their own choosing, as well as assigned texts that build their subject-area knowledge. All the while, they set goals with their teachers so that they can gauge their own progress. Forward motion toward a goal matters.

No More Guesswork

Gone are the days when text was judged as difficult solely on the basis of sentence length and syllable count. We now know that many factors affect text complexity. With this increased understanding, teachers do not have to rely on intuition to figure out which books their students can handle. Instead, teachers can select texts worthy of instruction and align their instructional efforts to ensure that all their students read complex, interesting, and important texts.

Endnote

Stahl, S. A., & Fairbanks, M. M. (1986). The effects of vocabulary instruction: A model-based meta-analysis. Review of Educational Research, 56, 72-110.

Timothy Shanahan is a professor and department chair, Department of Curriculum and Instruction, University of Illinois, Chicago. Douglas Fisher and Nancy Frey are professors in the Department of Teacher Education at San Diego State University, California.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
March 2012 | Volume 69 | Number 6 Reading: The Core Skill Pages 58-62 Timothy Shanahan, Douglas Fisher and Nancy Frey To help students learn to read complex texts, teachers need to answer the question, What do we mean when we say that a text is difficult?

# data[].attributes.body
Author Jason Reynolds share how he came to reading later in life.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Jason Reynolds can empathize with kids who don't like to read: He was 17 before he read a book cover to cover. It's a fact he's shared with thousands of kids in classrooms and auditoriums across the country, as a cautionary tale.

"It's not something I'm proud of. It's not cool," he told a group of seventh-graders in Stafford, Va. "The truth is, my life was made infinitely more difficult because I didn't read any books. But I didn't read any books. That's my story. That's my truth."

This week Reynolds will publish his ninth book - his third this year: a novel in verse called "Long Way Down" about a young man coping with the shooting death of his brother. It was longlisted for the National Book Award for Young People's Literature. At 33, Reynolds is a best-selling author with an array of awards, including multiple Coretta Scott King Book Award honors and an NAACP Image Award. He's been a National Book Award finalist, shared stages with Ta-Nehisi Coates and Rep. John Lewis and appeared in the pages of People magazine.

All of which asks the question Reynolds posed to his young audience: "How is it that a kid like me, a kid who grew up reading no books, eventually became a man who writes books for y'all?"

The tale of Reynolds's transformation from a nonreader living on the edge in Oxon Hill, Md., to a literary celebrity is the kind of relatable story he wished he'd read when he was a kid. "It's hard to be what you can't see," he said in an interview in the District, where he lives part-time.

When he was in school, teachers gave him the classics - Shakespeare, "Moby-Dick," "Lord of the Flies." They didn't click with him. As he explained to his middle-school audience, "The teacher was like, 'Read this book about this man chasing a whale,' and I'm like, bruh. . . . I don't know if I can connect to a man chasing a whale when I've never seen a whale," he said. "Nothing that's happening in these books is happening in my neighborhood."

Reynolds writes books about what's happening in his neighborhood. "Ghost" tells the story of a boy who joins a track team as an escape from the violence in his past. "The Boy in the Black Suit" tells the story of a city kid grieving the death of his mother. "When I Was the Greatest," tells the story of a group of friends navigating the streets of non-gentrified Bed-Stuy in Brooklyn. The voices are those Reynolds heard around him in the 1980s and 90s, in a neighborhood where drugs and violence were on his doorstep, but inside was a loving family - aunties and close friends, one of whom taught Reynolds how to crochet (which he still does).

Written for middle-graders and teens, Reynolds's books address difficult subjects, but they aren't scary. They reflect his understanding of the fears and challenges that all young people experience. They also reflect his awareness that today's kids face huge distractions: "The literary world has to compete with YouTube, Instagram, PlayStation, Xbox, Hulu" and so on, he acknowledges. When it comes to books and reading, "we have to get creative."

The finger-wagging and required reading lists of well-meaning teachers and parents can backfire, he says. Instead, Reynolds recommends books written in a "natural tongue," in comparative literature and the use of nontraditional materials - comic books and rap music, for example - "as a catalyst for literacy."

Reynolds recognizes the constraints that teachers face but hopes for greater creativity in curriculums. "We should say okay, let's watch 'The Handmaid's Tale' and then read it, draw comparisons," he says. Kids need to see the relationship between pop culture and high culture - the connections, for example, among Shakespeare, "West Side Story" and "Twilight," or between "Lord of the Flies" and "The Hunger Games." "Let's take a rap song and figure out how we can connect it to a piece of literature," he says.
[How to get kids to look away from their screens and take pleasure in books]
It was rap music, in fact, that opened Reynolds to the world of literature. As he likes to tell his middle-school audiences, one day back in Oxon Hill, he went to the store and bought a Queen Latifah cassette tape for $5. As he was listening and rapping along, he opened the liner notes and made a life-changing discovery: "This is also literature in the form of poetry, but it sounds like me."

The first book he read, just before he turned 18, was Richard Wright's "Black Boy." "The mischief in that book," he says, "reminded me of the mischief that my friends and I had done." Reynolds, then a student at Bishop McNamara High School in Prince George's County, Md. (the same school, coincidentally, that "Wimpy Kid" creator Jeff Kinney had attended years earlier), delved into the works of Toni Morrison and other African American authors. But he confesses that he was by no means a stellar student or an avid reader.

What it sparked in him, though, was a love of language, and so he began writing. As a student at the University of Maryland, he and his best friend wrote a book together called "Self." A collection of poetry and art, it's something Reynolds laughs about now. He and his friend went into debt printing it, and after graduation, they brought it to New York, expecting to get a deal. What they got was an agent and an editor: Joanna Cotler at HarperCollins, who took them under her wing and encouraged them to write books for reluctant young readers. It was a demographic Reynolds knew well.

The result was "My Name Is Jason. Mine Too" (2009). It was not exactly a commercial success. A broke and disheartened Reynolds returned to the D.C. area, put aside his literary dream and went to work for his father, the director of a mental health clinic. Being a caseworker and helping clients get medicine and shelter taught him "true empathy," he says. "I learned just how interesting stories can be, how complex humanity really is, how necessary it is sometimes to humanize those who have been vilified."

After a year, Reynolds returned to New York but not to be a writer. He needed money, so he began working in retail, becoming a manager of a Rag & Bone clothing store in Manhattan. And he'd still be there, he says - he'd been rejected three times by graduate schools because of his poor grades - were it not for the intervention of an old friend, the writer Christopher Myers.

Myers encouraged Reynolds to write in his own voice and to tell stories about "the neighborhood kids, the black and brown kids who need to know that they exist, that they are special and valuable." So that's what Reynolds did, often while standing at the cash register when business was slow. "When I Was the Greatest" came out in 2014. The book was a critical success and gave Reynolds the confidence to embrace his identity as a writer. Nearly a decade since his publishing debut, he says with a smile, "Here we are, rockin'."

Reynolds says he hopes that his books can serve as both a mirror of a life and a window into another. "All I want kids to know is that I see them for who they are and not who everyone thinks they are," he says. He is committed, he says, to getting their stories right - "and putting that on the page with integrity and balance, to acknowledge the glory and the brokenness. That's all I want to do. It's a lot, but so are they."

Nora Krug is an editor in Book World. At 7 p.m. on Thursday, Jason Reynolds will be at Politics & Prose, 5015 Connecticut Ave. NW.

Read more:

Three books to inspire young readers to bravery

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's advice for living boldly

Long Way down

By Jason Reynolds

Atheneum/Caitlyn Dlouhy. 320 pp. $17.99

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
How a kid who didn't read a book until he was 17 grew up to become a literary star

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Jason Reynolds can empathize with kids who don't like to read: He was 17 before he read a book cover to cover. It's a fact he's shared with thousands of kids in classrooms and auditoriums across the country, as a cautionary tale. "It's not something I'm proud of.

# data[].attributes.body
This article inspired the Project LIT movement.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Just a couple of miles north of Anacostia, for example, in the borderline Washington neighborhood known as Capitol Hill, Neuman and Moland found more than 2,000 children's print resources in stores-i.e., a book for every two kids. While still equipped with relatively few reading resources, the borderline neighborhoods the researchers studied, overall, had 16 times as many books as their high-poverty counterparts.

Equating access to books with access to stores that sell books is hardly perfect, but it makes a good deal of sense when considering the existing data on the book habits and day-to-day realities of low-income families. Statistically, poor families are far less likely to utilize public libraries, whether it's because they're not acclimated to using them or because they're worried about being charged late fines, or because they're skeptical of putting their name on a card associated with a government entity. Neuman has found that only 8 percent of such families report they have taken advantage of library resources.

Meanwhile, even though parents could in theory easily order books for their kids from online stores like Amazon, a perhaps surprising percentage of low-income families lack access to high-speed internet at home-a little over half of those with children under 8, according to a 2013 study. And only 61 percent of poor families with young children, according to the same study, have internet-enabled mobile devices. That means the presence of brick-and-mortar stores where books are sold can be critical, especially during the summer months when poor children aren't in school and lose many of the academic skills they developed over the previous year.

As with exposure to vocabulary, access to books can have both immediate and longer-term impacts on a child's academic and socioeconomic outcomes. Living in a book desert "may seriously constrain young children's opportunities to come to school 'ready to learn,'" Neuman and Moland write. A lack of access to books may help explain why, according to some research, children from economically disadvantaged communities score 60 percent lower on kindergarten-readiness tests that assess kids' familiarity with knowledge as basic as sounds, colors, and numbers. And researchers say living in a book desert in one's early years can have psychological ripple effects: "When there are no books, or when there are so few that choice is not an option, book reading becomes an occasion and not a routine," they write.

According to Neuman, who, as the assistant education secretary under Bush, was in charge of implementing No Child Left Behind, the stalled achievement rates of the country's children show that more emphasis needs to be placed on what happens in their lives outside of schools. "We have seen that No Child Left Behind was an effort to really improve schools while ignoring parent education," she said. "What we realize is that children are out of school more than they're in it." Contrary to the conventional assumption that academic interventions can only happen in school, she continued, some of the most critical factors in kids' achievement involve family and environment.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
The Children Who Grow Up in 'Book Deserts'

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Just a couple of miles north of Anacostia, for example, in the borderline Washington neighborhood known as Capitol Hill, Neuman and Moland found more than 2,000 children's print resources in stores-i.e., a book for every two kids. While still equipped with relatively few reading resources, the borderline neighborhoods the researchers studied, overall, had 16 times as many books as their high-poverty counterparts.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
The project was created in 2010 with a simple goal in mind; one book to connect the world. From its humble beginnings, the GRA has grown to make a truly global connection with milllions of students having participated.

What is it?

The premise is simple; we pick a book to read aloud to our students during a set 6-week period and during that time we try to make as many global connections as possible. Each teacher decides how much time they would like to dedicate and how involved they would like to be. Some people choose to connect with just one class, while others go for as many as possible. The scope and depth of the project is up to you. While there are commonly used such as Skype, Twitter, Padlet, or Flipgrid, you choose the tools that will make the most sense for you. Teachers get a community of other educators to do a global project with, hopefully inspiring them to continue these connections through the year.

When is it?

Once a year, starting in early October and running through mid-November. Due to the time commitment, this is only a once a year project, however, two fantastic spin-off projects run at other times; the New Zealand Read Aloud and the French version of GRA, Ecouter Lire le Monde.

I have questions as a Participant

Please see " For Participants" to have all of your questions answered.

I have questions as an Author

Please see "For Authors" to have all of your questions answered.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
To see the blog with the latest news and ideas, go here. To join our Facebook Community, go here - this is how you sign up The project was created in 2010 with a simple goal in mind; one book to connect the world. From its humble beginnings, the GRA has grown to make a...

# data[].attributes.headline
PROJECT LIT Books- Hyperdoc with resources for each book

# data[].attributes.subject
PROJECT LIT Books- Hyperdoc with resources for each book

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
2018-19 Project LIT Selections The Hyperdoc!

# data[].attributes.body
#ProjectLITBookClub
#ProjectLITchat
#bookaday
#mglit
#mgbookchat
#edchat

# data[].attributes.body
Learn about classroom libraries and best practices from a high school English teacher.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
While comic books and graphic novels have increased in popularity among children of all ages in the last few years, there are still some parents and educators that dismiss the medium as trivial or "not a real book" or "junk." We live in a visual society. It only makes sense that children are drawn to visual media.

Here are some things you might not know about comic books and graphic novels and how they can turn your child into a "super" reader:

1. Not all comics are about superheroes, and graphic novels do not always include "graphic" storylines. Did you know that there's a Pride and Prejudice graphic novel? Or that popular Shakespearean plays have been adapted into graphic novels? Did you know that the graphic novel American Born Chinese won the American Library Association's Printz Award in 2007? Face it, comics and graphic novels are on their way to becoming mainstream!

2. Some teachers and librarians on the 2014 New York Comic Con panel "Super Girls: Using Comics to Engage Female Students in the High School Classroom" listed these as some of the benefits and skills strengthened by graphic novels: motivating reluctant readers, inference, memory, sequencing, understanding succinct language, and reading comprehension.

3. Do you have a kid that skims the page or speed reads? When reading comics, children slow down and look at the images and text to fully ingest what's happening in the plot.

4. Graphic novels are bringing art education (which is often an endangered program in schools) into the classroom.

5. Graphic novels can be paired with traditional classics. One high school teacher on the "Super Girls" panel said that he's found success in pairing a canonical text likeThe Scarlet Letter with a graphic novel like . Both titles are centered on female protagonists feeling alienated, which a lot of tween and teen girls can relate to.

6. Speaking of girls, comics aren't just for boys. Everybody enjoys a good story. And there are plenty of great graphic novels available for kids of all ages. You can check out some titles listed here or ask your local librarian for suggestions.

7. Teachers and librarians on the "Why Should I Let My Child Read Comics?" panel agreed that graphic novels are great for kids with learning disabilities. Children with autism can learn a lot about identifying emotions through the images in a graphic novel. Additionally, for children with dyslexia, while it might be very frustrating for them to finish a page of a traditional book, they often feel a sense of accomplishment when they complete a page in a comic book. Accomplishment is important. It's a huge self-esteem booster and leads to kids naturally wanting to read more.

8. However, when kids have lower self-esteem because they aren't strong readers that can discourage them from wanting to read. But graphic novels are a great way to promote literacy. Teachers and librarians do not want to give ESL students picture books. Kids would reject that and deem it embarrassing. However, a comic book at a lower reading level might give kids the reading confidence they need while boosting reading and language skills.

9. Reading comic books is a great way to share the joy of reading with your child. If you grew up reading Archie or Spider-Man comics, you can share that with your reader now. It's a great way to strengthen your bond. Plus, kids look up to their parents and want to share and discuss those favorite comics or moments or scenes with you. It's a no brainer!

10. Do you remember those wordless picture books that your toddler might have chewed on? Well, there are also wordless comic books. These offer a plethora of learning benefits - critical thinking, sequencing, imagination, storytelling, and creativity. Just think, every time that your child reads the book, it will be completely unique. Although the book is filled with pictures, it's a blank slate just waiting for your child's imagination to take shape.

Remember, there are a ton of great books and a ton of not-so-great books. The same is true of graphic novels and comics. Do your homework before choosing graphic novels for kids. Go to the experts if you need advice -- teachers and librarians are there to help!

Share your thoughts on pleasure reading for kids on our Facebook page!

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Raising Super Readers: The Benefits of Comic Books and Graphic Novels

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
While comic books and graphic novels have increased in popularity among children of all ages in the last few years, there are still some parents and educators that dismiss the medium as trivial or "not a real book" or "junk." We live in a visual society.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Didn't find what you were looking for? First, try this.

If you typed the URL directly, please make sure the spelling is correct.

If you clicked on a link to get here, the link may be outdated.

Use the search functionality to find what you came here for.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
If you typed the URL directly, please make sure the spelling is correct. If you clicked on a link to get here, the link may be outdated. Use the search functionality to find what you came here for.

# data[].attributes.headline
25 Book Reading Challenge- Pernille Ripp

# data[].attributes.subject
25 Book Reading Challenge- Pernille Ripp

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
33% of my 118 7th graders told me they had not read a single book last summer. That books were just not their thing or they were simply too busy. 33%...Many of them told me they had read the book club books they had been assigned the year before but not that much else. Some told me they had fake read most of their way through years prior, averaging 1 to 2 books a year if even. Some told me how much they loved books, that their summers were spent with their nose in pages because what else would you do when you have all of the time in the world

Teaching 7th graders has taught me many things, but one of the biggest is the incredible need to inspire a larger love of reading in more of their lives. Not because teachers before them haven't, but because for some reason it hasn't completely stuck for all of them. So that becomes our mission; for the students to fall in love with reading or at the very least hate it less.

When I read the Book Whisperer by Donalyn Miller, it significantly changed my reading instruction as a teacher. Coupled with other landmark books for me such as The Daily Five by The Two Sisters, and also Mosaic of Thought by Elin Keene and Susan Zimmerman, I finally felt like I had a path I could follow when it came to the aspiration of reading. It was as if I did not know how high of expectations I could hold my students to until after I read these books. Donalyn's 40 Book Challenge became a central tenet of my instruction, not as a requirement, but as a way for my students to challenge themselves. While I made tweaks because that is what reflective teachers do, I stayed true to its original intent; to challenge my students to read voraciously, based on the research that Donalyn cites in her book that kids who score in the 90th percentile of reading tests read between 30-40 books a year. I did not offer incentives. I did not do logs. I did not tell my less developed readers that their goals should be less because there was no way they could accomplish 40 books. I asked them to shoot for 40 or more and then helped them reach their goals by giving them time to read, time to book shop, and support as they needed. Some kids made their goals, others did not, but they all read more than they had before.

I knew that when I moved to 7th grade I wanted to do the 40 Book Challenge but I was also faced with the incredible limitation of 45-minute instructional blocks. 45 minutes to do everything. 45 minutes that only allowed me to give them 10 measly minutes of reading, rather than the 30 we had enjoyed in 5th grade. After my first week with my 7th graders, I decided to change the language of the challenge in the beginning to 25 books rather than the 40, not because I did not believe that my 7th graders could not read 40 books, but because for some, simply saying 40 in the beginning seemed completely un-doable, especially because I could only give them 10 minutes of reading time every day. However, if I had 60 minutes or more, I would still start with 40 books, after all with that amount of time kids should be given at least 20 minutes of reading every day. But the idea remained; this was a challenge, something to strive for, something to work toward, and something that I believe all of my students can reach if we help them have successful reading experiences.

It appears that some believe that because I have called this the 25 book challenge in the past that that means I want my students to only read 25 books. That somehow the original 40 book challenge is too hard for kids. Neither of these statements are true. All kids should be challenged to read 40 books or more. I believe all of my students can read more than 25 books, my job is often to help them believe it too. But just as in the original, it is not really about reaching the quantity set, it is about having incredible reading experiences.

As the year goes on we, therefore, adjust our goal, some continue to focus on the quantity while others change their focus either to different genres, harder vocabulary or even formats that they have not dabbled in before. While some kids continue to focus on quantity, and for them we do the following breakdown for how books count, for others the challenge morphs into figuring out how they can push themselves as readers beyond a quantity standpoint. (To see more about this read about the reading identity challenge).

Books under 200 pages count as 1 book

Books over 200 pages count as 2 books

Books over 500 pages count as 3 books

Books more than 750 - see the teacher

Depending on its size a graphic novel may count as a whole, half or quarter of a book.

10 of the books have to be chapter books

If this goal is not high enough for a learner, they set a higher goal

They write down their titles in a reader's notebook we keep at school and update it every Monday or whenever needed.

To see the hand out I give my students, please go here

I do not ask them to read certain genres but instead take this as an opportunity for them to explore themselves as readers and figure out what they love to read. I constantly book talk books, as do they once we get rolling, and I am constantly sharing recommendations to individual students. We practice free book abandonment, making sure that the books we read are books we actually want to read, and we book shop monthly if not more. Our to-be-read lists are extensions of our reading life and are used weekly, if not daily.

After three years with 7th-grade book challenge, I can tell you, it works. I am not surprised, after all, Donalyn Miller and her ideas have never let me down. While not all kids reach their goals, many do, and many of those who did, never thought they would. Yet the biggest success is not just the kids that reach their goal but within the kids that don't. As one child told me on his reading survey, "...I even read a book at home for fun, I had never done that before." That child's number? Five more than the year before. Five more great books that he loved so much he book talked them to others. Books that gave him such a great experience that he continues to chase that feeling again.

I will not pretend that it worked for everyone, there are always kids that issuing a challenge will not work for, where what we did together was not enough, but there are so many that it made a difference for. Where the expectation to read every single day and reach a certain goal that mattered to them meant that they turned up their reading, that they selected their books more carefully, that they spent a longer stretch reading then they normally would have.

So for the 118 7th graders that I teach, I am so grateful that they believed me when I told then, "Yes, you can read more books." But do not take my word for it; let these pictures show you what it looks like when 7th graders read and become readers. Let these pictures show you that yes we can get kids at this age to read, that just because a child is going through huge personal development reading does not have to become not lost. What matters is the reading community we create. And the high expectations we have for all of our kids.

And in case you are wondering, that is 4,357.5 books. Not bad for how many kids told me that reading was not something they felt like doing.
If you like what you read here, consider reading my newest book, Passionate Readers - The Art of Reaching and Engaging Every Child, out August 2017. This book focuses on the five keys we can implement into any reading community to strengthen student reading experiences, even within the 45 minute English block. If you are looking for solutions and ideas for how to re-engage all of your students consider reading my very first book Passionate Learners - How to Engage and Empower Your Students. Also, if you are wondering where I will be in the coming year or would like to have me speak, please see this page.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
33% of my 118 7th graders told me they had not read a single book last summer. That books were just not their thing or they were simply too busy. 33%...Many of them told me they had read the ...

# data[].attributes.headline
In 2017, the PEW Research Center reported that 27% of adults had not read a book in a year. 

# data[].attributes.subject
In 2017, the PEW Research Center reported that 27% of adults had not read a book in a year. 

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
About a quarter of American adults (24%) say they haven't read a book in whole or in part in the past year, whether in print, electronic or audio form. Who are these non-book readers?

Several demographic traits correlate with non-book reading, Pew Research Center surveys have found. For instance, adults with a high school degree or less are about five times as likely as college graduates (37% vs. 7%) to report not reading books in any format in the past year. Adults with lower levels of educational attainment are also among the least likely to own smartphones, even as e-book reading on these devices has increased substantially since 2011. (College-educated adults are more likely to own these devices and use them to read e-books.)

Adults with annual household incomes of $30,000 or less are about three times as likely as the most affluent adults to be non-book readers (36% vs. 13%). Hispanic adults are about twice as likely as whites (38% vs. 20%) to report not having read a book in the past 12 months. But there are differences between Hispanics born inside and outside the U.S.: Roughly half (51%) of foreign-born Hispanics report not having read a book, compared with 22% of Hispanics born in the U.S.

Older Americans are a bit more likely than their younger counterparts not to have read a book. Some 28% of adults ages 50 and older have not read a book in the past year, compared with 20% of adults under 50. There are modest differences when looking at gender and whether people live in urban, suburban or rural areas.

The share of Americans who report not reading any books in the past 12 months has bounced around a bit since 2011, when Pew Research Center first began conducting surveys about book-reading habits. That year, 19% of adults reported not reading any books. The share of non-book readers hit a high point of 27% in 2015.

The same demographic traits that characterize non-book readers also often apply to those who have never been to a library. In a 2016 survey, we found that Hispanics, older adults, those living in households earning less than $30,000 and those who have a high school diploma or did not graduate from high school are the most likely to report they have never been to a public library.
Note: This is an update of a post originally published on Nov. 23, 2016.
Topics: Education, Demographics, Libraries, Leisure Activities

Andrew Perrin is a research analyst focusing on internet and technology at Pew Research Center.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
About a quarter of American adults (24%) say they haven't read a book in whole or in part in the past year, whether in print, electronic or audio form. Who are these non-book readers? Several demographic traits correlate with non-book reading, Pew Research Center surveys have found.

# data[].attributes.headline
How to create time to read in a 45 minute class- Pernille Ripp

# data[].attributes.subject
How to create time to read in a 45 minute class- Pernille Ripp

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
"I would give them time to read but I don't have the time..."

The words haunt me several weeks later. Shocking in their simplicity, yet profound in their meaning. I didn't have the courage then to address it but I have the courage now.

You see, that statement represents so much of what goes wrong in our reading instruction. We want kids to read but expect them to do it outside of our classrooms. We want them to grow as readers but expect them to fall into the pages of a book on their own. We want them to be readers but then tell them that with us we don't have to practice because surely they know how to do that already. And yet the numbers don't lie. The increase in summer slide, in kids who say they don't read for fun and the scary statistic that says that 26% of adults haven't read a book in the last year.

And we wonder why we seem to be turning from a nation of readers into a nation of watchers.

It starts with us. It starts with the way we choose to spend our time. It starts with our lesson planning. We nurture the seeds of reading and make the decisions that will help them grow or wither. With us, the reading should start so that it has a chance to continue once they leave us. It is as simple as that.

So how do we find the time to have kids read when we don't have the time? The answer lies in the small things, the small tweaks that we make every single day with one goal in mind; more time to read.
We start with independent reading. Every day.
My students start every single class with 10 minutes of uninterrupted free choice reading time. I do reading check-ins during this time, but their job is to read. To fall into the pages of a book. Nothing else. Every child is expected to read, and for those who fight it every single day, I keep trying every single day. I wish I could give more but 10 isthe least I can give, if I had a longer class period, I would give more time.
Ask yourself; what if we started with independent reading, what is the worst that could happen? We figure out our learning target.
While I don't love everything about learning targets, they do force me to think about the ONE thing that I want students to grow in. Too often we pile many different lessons into one, which increases our talk time. Instead, really narrow down what is the most important for today and then focus your lesson in on just that. I know that I teach many different skills in one day, but this helps clear up some of the clutter.
Ask yourself; what is the one skill we really need to focus on today? We stop talking so much.
Teachers are estimated to speak 60-75 % of the time. So if you teach in 45 minute periods like I do, we are dominating almost 30 minutes of that time. No wonder we say we don't have the time. Yet how much of that time talking is spent on repeating instructions, on giving extra directions, or simply trying to answer every single thing question asked in front of the whole class. So set a timer, record yourself, have someone observe you, or ask a child to stop you after a certain amount of time. Couple this with a specific goal and then stick to it when someone says you are out of time. If it is a lengthy lesson, which mine sometimes are, explain why to the kids and then help them get up and move. But again, if you start with reading then you will already have preserved their reading time.
Ask yourself; how can I find out how much time I actually spend talking? We get to the point.
I know we are supposed to activate background knowledge, share personal stories, and really suck kids into our instruction but how often do we get so wrapped up in sucking them in that we lose them by the time we finally get to the point. Keep the introduction short, it is, after all, the introduction, and get to the meat of the lesson more quickly.
Ask yourself; How can I keep my introduction to only a few sentences? We do most of our teaching in small groups rather than whole class.
How often do our lessons increase because we are trying to teach all the skills to all the students and yet what is really needed is one major teaching point and then tons of small groups for personalized instruction? So focus your one thing in on what all the kids need and then save everything else for small group instruction. That way kids are getting what they need rather than tuning out in a large class.
Ask yourself; is this needed for all of the kids or just some of them? We re-evaluate our routines.
Independent reading is my bell-ringer, it is my task to do while I do attendance. It is the thing to do while kids get settled in. It is the thing to do while I check in on a kid. It the thing to do while we wait for the last kid to show up. If you are waiting for something you read. If you think you are done and need to check in with me you read until we can speak.
Ask yourself: What small things take up time in your everyday routine that could be converted into reading time because, truly, every minute counts? We cut out the extra stuff.
Just like we speak too much during class, we also have kids go through unnecessary hoops to teach and practice their skills. Do they really need to "do" something every day with their reading other than talk? Can they simply read some days and not write about it? Not post-it note it? Not do mini jots or other tasks? I fear we often feel that we need proof that their reading meant something or that they got something out of it, and that leads us creating more tasks to do. We focus a lot on longer projects so that we minimize the time spent doing stuff around their reading.
Ask yourself; is the task I planned for them to do essential or filler? We grow our patience.
We often stop with independent reading because not ALL kids are reading, not ALL kids are making great choices, not ALL kids are using it well. But some are. The thing is, it takes time, sometimes months, sometimes years to help kids embrace independent reading. For some, it seems an impossible task and yet, we can nurture them as readers every single day. We can show that our belief in them being well-developed readers is strong and that we will keep believing in them every single day, even if they reject us completely.
Ask yourself; Am I making whole class decisions based on a few kids?
If we want kids to be readers we give them time to read, I cannot state this enough. I cannot bold it enough. I cannot repeat it enough. We cannot wonder why our students are not reading if we don't give them time to do so with us. Then that's on us. And if you don't believe me, read the research courtesy of Donalyn Miller.
If you like what you read here, consider reading my newest book, Passionate Readers - The Art of Reaching and Engaging Every Child, out August 2017. This book focuses on the five keys we can implement into any reading community to strengthen student reading experiences, even within the 45 minute English block. If you are looking for solutions and ideas for how to re-engage all of your students consider reading my very first book Passionate Learners - How to Engage and Empower Your Students. Also, if you are wondering where I will be in the coming year or would like to have me speak, please see this page.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Finding the Time for Independent Reading - Every Day, Every Kid

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
"I would give them time to read but I don't have the time..." The words haunt me several weeks later. Shocking in their simplicity, yet profound in their meaning. I didn't have the courage then to address it but I have the courage now. You see, that statement represents so much of what goes wrong in...

# data[].attributes.body
Step by step ways to create a reading culture in your classroom.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
So many of us are trying to create passionate reading environments, we are doing all the things the experts tell us to do, and yet, something just isn't clicking. Some kids are reading sure, but they would probably be reading any way, others though, not so much. Our passionate reading environments are just not working for all of our kids.

When I moved from 5th to 7th I knew I would be up against a challenge, after all, I had seen the slow decline of reading in my 5th graders and was pretty sure it would continue as they got older. And I was right, by 7th graders some of my students are not just disliking books, some really hate reading. And they are vocal about it! So what have I done to continue to create passionate reading environments? Here are a few ideas...

Invested in books. Every single book that I have in my classroom, pretty much, is a book that I think might capture a reader. When a book gets worn, I replace it. If a book has a bad cover, I try to see if a new version has come out with an updated cover. While I know our libraries should have massive amounts of books for all readers, I also believe in quality over quantity.

Diversity in books. The #WeNeedDiverseBooks movement have really gained momentum the past year, and rightfully so, and I couldn't agree more. Our students need to be able to find themselves and their lives within the books we have. Not just across racial lines or economic lines but also in the narratives of their self-identity. These three books are doing just that for many of our students.

Easy access to our books. All of my books are in bins and they are right at their fingertips. No check out system, no asking for permission. And we need it in our classrooms, not just in the book room or in the main library. We need to have in-class libraries so that students can bookshop whenever they need to and so that they can be enticed to read.

Giving choice. Choice in seating, choice in books, choice in way of reading.

Free abandonment. Students think they need permission to abandon books for some reason and so I celebrate freely whenever I abandon a book. I ask the kids if someone wants to prove me wrong when I abandon a book and they always do. Sometimes they commiserate with me about how that book is not well-written and other times they argue that I am so wrong. What it does though is that it signals to kids that they should be selective in their reading as well, because that is the sign of a wild reader, to quote Donalyn Miller's amazing book!

Leaving time to talk books. Too often we over-schedule our lessons and don't leave time to just talk about what we are reading and why it is amazing. So find holes in your schedule where students can just talk books without any project attached to it.

Teacher recommendations. I start many classes with the 1 minute book recommendation sharing why I loved a book or why I bought a book. Then I place it on a ledge and walk away. I do different recommendation in all of my classes.

Student recommendations. We talk about books quite a bit, both in structured and unstructured ways. We do the 1 minute speed book dating where students face each other in two long rows and one side recommends their book in a minute, one the timer buzzes they go to the next person and recommend it to them. I leave book piles out on tables for students to browse through as they enter. These are not just new books but also some of my favorite older books that students may not have discovered. They have a "Favorite reads" book tree, where they can leave their favorite books for other students to read.

The To-Be-Read List. Students need to always have an idea of what they will be reading next so we have a paper list this year of the books we cannot wait to read. Next year, we will move to use Goodreads as a way to keep track of what we have read, offer suggestions and also have a way for our friends to see what we are reading.

It is judgment free. I am not the reading police and while I continually recommend books to students I will not stop them from reading a book, nor will I judge them based on what they are reading. Sometimes your strongest readers need a break, other times your developing readers need a challenge. Letting them figure out what they need at a particular time is incredibly empowering for students and definitely necessary.

Celebrating the re-read. I re-read picture books all of the time and often find myself gravitating toward certain books. The Poisonwood Bible is a book I have read several times, relishing the vague recollection of what happens but also discovering the text in new way each time. Too often we assume that students are re-reading because they lack inspiration, but that may not be the case. Some kids are re-reading to discover more about the text, that is true close reading.

No need for speed. Because we are reading log free, we have no need to track minutes or pages. Students read as much as they can in our independent reading time and I only ask them to write down the title. We do a 25 book challenge for all students, or higher if need be, and all students keep track of how many books they have read. Larger books count for more than one so that students are not discouraged from reading thick books, but can read whatever they want. And yes, picture books or graphic novels count as well.

Protecting independent reading time. Often our independent reading time is what we sacrifice when we have a lot to cover, and yet, this is the thing we need to protect the most. I start almost every class period with 10 minutes of independent reading and it is sacred time for us (thank you for the idea Jillian Heise!). Some times that is the only reading time students get and they need it. If we worry about whether a kid is reading outside of school pay attention to what they are reading inside this time. This is where I can help kids to find better books or help them develop their skills to pick books.

Creating enticing libraries. Kids love book stores because the books are exciting, even our most reluctant readers will pick a new book of the shelves if we display it well. So I pay very close attention to how books are displayed; I use all ledges, have a gutter hanging on the wall for picture books, and I switch out the books often. I want students to pick up the books and flip through them so I have to create opportunities for that to happen.

Creating reading role models. Students need reading role models, and not just adult ones. I love being passionate reader and it is something I showcase any chance I get in our classroom, but more importantly students need to see students who are reading role models as well. We Skype with other classes to share book recommendations, we share our favorite books on our blog, and we give students time to take on the role of role model. We need to create communities of readers where students have room to discover each other as individuals so they can learn from each other.

Let them order books. If a child says they cannot find a book they love, then I pull out a Scholastic catalog or get on Amazon and I let them choose a book. I use bonus points when I can or I buy the book myself if I need to. Sometimes simply being able to completely choose a brand new book means that a child will at least try to read the books.

Crack your hardest nut. You know that kid that really hates reading and almost flaunts it every chance they get. Spend your energy on them because often they are influencing the way their peers are thinking. So they are the ones I continually pass books to, they are the ones I am always talking books with, and they are the ones that I try to get be a reading role model if I can get them hooked.

Embrace mature books. These are the books that some of our most reluctant readers will finally pick up. The ones with the swear words, or the ones with the little bit more mature story lines. Be selective, set your standards, but don't shield all readers from mature books. These can be "that" book for some of our kids who otherwise will never read.

Ask your students. Too often we assume that we know why students are not reading, so we never ask, but that is the very first thing we need to do. Ask your students to discuss why they hate reading and get those demons out in the open so that you can start to work with them rather than just assume you know what the problem is.

Stay passionate. There are times when we get so busy that reading was pushed to the side, yet often within our busyness is when we need to embrace our passion even more. So re-ignite your own passion, change things up, go on a mission to find the most magnificent book you have ever read so that you can hand it to students. Don't let the outside world influence your inside passionate classroom.

Become a reading warrior. No more quiet compliance when initiatives are introduced that we know will hurt students' love of reading, we have to band together and start speaking up for our students. Their love of reading is too sacred for us to stay silent any longer. Here is the blog post that discusses this more.

What did I miss?

I missed one of the biggest ones! Thank you Rachel Yoder!

Partner with the librarian! Whether your school has one (which every school should!) or you partner with your local librarian, bringing in another knowledgable reading adult is a sure fire way to have an even bigger impact. You are not alone in trying to create passionate reading environments, your librarian should be a trusted ally.

To see how all of my books are organized, go here.

To organize your own library, including check out, go here.

To see my book review blog, go here.
I am a passionate teacher in Oregon, Wisconsin, USA but originally from Denmark, who has taught 4th, 5th, and 7th grade. Proud techy geek, and mass consumer of incredible books. Creator of the Global Read Aloud Project, Co-founder of EdCamp MadWI, and believer in all children. The second edition of my first book "Passionate Learners - How to Engage and Empower Your Students" is available for pre-order now. Second book"Empowered Schools, Empowered Students - Creating Connected and Invested Learners" is out now from Corwin Press. Join our Passionate Learners community on Facebook and follow me on Twitter @PernilleRipp.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
But The Kids Aren't Reading - 20 Ideas for Creating Passionate Reading Environments

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
So many of us are trying to create passionate reading environments, we are doing all the things the experts tell us to do, and yet, something just isn't clicking. Some kids are reading sure, but they would probably be reading any way, others though, not so much.

# data[].attributes.headline
40 Book Challenge Revisited- Donalyn Miller

# data[].attributes.subject
40 Book Challenge Revisited- Donalyn Miller

# data[].attributes.body
Additional thoughts on the 40 book challenges- what it's meant to accomplish

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Years ago, at a professional development workshop, Ellin Keene poked fun at the creator of the overwrought and overused "Text-to-Self, Text-to-Text, Text-to-World" reading strategy. If you're laughing right now, you know that Ellin is one of the original architects of this strategy, which appears in her groundbreaking book (co-authored with Susan Zimmerman), Mosaic of Thought.

A few years back, a woman proudly announced to me at a workshop that she was, "doing her own version of the Daily 5, but she could only get in three of them." I imagine Gail and Joan want to know which three. I should have asked, ladies, but I was at a loss for words.

It happens; the original thinking behind an instructional idea becomes lost when it's passed along like a game of Telephone. You heard about it from a 60-minute conference session. Your teammate attended a book study and she gave you the highlight reel. The teacher down the hall is doing something innovative. You should try it. We've all seen the quick adoption of shiny, new ideas without a full picture of how these concepts fit into best practices (or don't).

I've shared many ideas through my teaching and writing, and I stand by what I've put out into the world-but the one idea most demanding a revisit is my 40 Book Challenge, which appears in The Book Whisperer. In a nutshell, the 40 Book Challenge invites students to read 40 books across different genres during the school year.

I wonder sometimes if I failed to communicate the true intentions behind the 40 Book Challenge. Teachers email me or contact me on Facebook and Twitter about it every day. I have also seen a lot of what my dear friend, Teresa Bunner calls, "Book Whisperer Gone Bad" activities that actually undermine children's development as independent readers instead of fostering it.

On Teachers-Pay-Teachers, I found worksheets, award certificates, rubrics, and posters using "The 40 Book Challenge." While citing me as the source (shudder), the teacher who designed these materials offers incentives and creates competition between readers-the antithesis of my teaching philosophy and research about incentives tied to reading.

An unfamiliar parent emailed me to complain. She tracked me down on the Internet after asking her son's teacher about the "outrageous requirement" that students read 40 books and complete 40 book reports this school year. Her son's teacher said the assignment was based on my work, and this upset mom wanted me to know that I was hurting her son. I responded that while I expect my students to read 40 books, I don't tie any assignments or grades to this expectation.

A close friend shared on Facebook that a teacher publicly humiliated his daughter because she "only" read 35 books this school year. The complexity or length of the books his daughter read weren't considered. What she gained from these reading experiences didn't matter, either.

Visiting a school last spring, a 4 th grade teacher told me that she didn't "allow" her students to "count" any books that were under 100 pages long. Walking the school library together, I asked the teacher to look at the biographies, traditional literature, and nonfiction texts available (and appropriate) for her 4 th graders to read. After 20 minutes of searching, we found 12 biographies that met her stringent guidelines. It never occurred to her that she was limiting her students' choices or access to books.

The 40 Book Challenge isn't an assignment you can simply add to outdated, ineffective teaching practices. The Book Challenge rests on the foundation of a classroom reading community built on research-based practices for engaging children with reading. Assigning a 40 Book Challenge as a way to generate grades or push children into reading in order to compete with their classmates corrupts everything I have written and said about reading. The 40 Book Challenge is meant to expand students' reading lives, not limit or define it.

The 40 Book Challenge is a personal challenge for each student, not a contest or competition between students or classes. In every competition or contest there are winners and losers. Why would we communicate to our students that they are reading losers? For some students, reading 40 books is an impossible leap from where they start as readers, and for others, it's not a challenge at all.

If Alex read two books in 4 th grade and reads 22 in 5 th grade, I am celebrating with him. What an accomplishment! Look how much Alex grew. He didn't grow because he read more books. He grew because he had 22 successful reading experiences.

Conversely, when Hailey read 55 books in 4 th grade, reading 40 books in 5 th grade isn't challenging her. Encouraging Hailey to read biographies and historical fiction, which she claims to detest, does more to stretch her than simply reading more books.

Honestly, I don't care if all of my students read 40 books or not. What matters is that students stretch themselves as readers and increase their competence, confidence, and reading motivation through their daily participation in our reading community. The 40 Book Challenge works for my students and me and for the many teachers successfully implementing it because of these core beliefs:

Everybody reads here. Let's get started. Our direct influence on students' reading lives lasts 40 weeks-36 weeks of school and 4 weeks of school vacation. Setting high expectations (roughly a book a week) communicates that reading is ongoing and continues from the first day of school to the last-hopefully longer. Students should spend more time reading than they spend completing reading-related activities like worksheets, reading responses, and projects. Students who read the most will always outperform the students who don't read much (Krashen, 2004).

*Strong readers have lots of reading experiences. You need to be a good all-around reader. Encouraging students to read widely-sampling books from every genre-improves their reading ability by expanding their reading experiences. If you spend every day working on your jump shot, you'll improve your jump shot. To be a strong all-around player, you must practice passing, guarding, and dribbling, too. To be a strong reader, you must practice reading poetry, fiction, nonfiction, wordless books, graphic novels, blog posts-a little bit of everything.

*There's the right book for you out there somewhere. Let's find it. For many students, trying a lot of books helps them find the one type of text that excites them and invites them into reading. True preferences come from years of wide reading-trying books, having some false starts, discovering authors, genres, and writing styles that we enjoy. Students who haven't read much may not have found the books that speak to them. Reading buffet-style-tasting all types of books-students can discover what the world of reading has to offer.

*Whether you read or not isn't a choice, but what you read is YOUR choice. I don't waste a lot of time at the beginning of the school year talking about why students might not like to read. Everybody reads here. Everybody is a reader. Whether you read or not is off the table, but what you read is your choice. Whatever you want. You pick. Providing students with choice in what they read increases their reading motivation and engagement (Gambrell, Coding, & Palmer, 1996; Worthy & McKool, 1996; Guthrie & Wigfield, 2000).

*Your reading life matters. Students' personal reading goals have as much value as our academic goals. Classrooms exert tremendous influence on the development of students' reading identities-whether it's positive or negative. While students learn the skills of reading, they must develop a positive reading identity to remain readers (Serafini, 2013).

Without these core beliefs in place, the 40 Book Challenge becomes another tedious reading assignment that drives kids away from reading. If students leave our classrooms hating to read or skate through without any positive reading experiences, we have failed. It doesn't matter what they scored on the reading test. It doesn't matter how many books they read if they stop reading when they leave our classrooms.

I recently received a Facebook message and photos from Aliza Werner, a third grade teacher at Parkway Elementary School in Glendale, Wisconsin. Aliza and her students held a 40 Book Challenge last school year, and she wanted to share her students' successes with me, "Through the challenge, we created an enormous sense of community that embraced comfort, security, growth, sharing, excitement, and organic learning and curiosity that I had never felt before in any class."

Aliza's 20 students read 1741 books last year and they all met or surpassed their academic reading goals. More important, these 9-year olds developed a bond with each other and with reading that will last long after 3 rd grade. Recounting anecdote after anecdote about her students' individual reading successes, Aliza told me, "I could go on and on, as I am so proud of each of them in their own way." Looking through the photos of Aliza's beaming students, this note from Kristen made me smile.

It's clear that Aliza and her students embraced the full intent of the 40 Book Challenge. Aliza says that her students are still chatting over the summer-sharing their reading. In a classroom culture where reading threads through every class day and every conversation-everyone grows as a reader and finds reading more interesting and personally meaningful. Every reader has value. Every reading experience has value. It doesn't matter who ultimately crosses an arbitrary finish line.

How can we empower our students and help them grow? How can we make reading an exciting adventure? What do we want our students to remember about reading and our classroom community when they leave? The 40 Book Challenge kicks off a year of reading. That's Day One. What about the rest of the year? Developing students' positive reading identities and development as lifelong readers-these must remain our priorities every day, all year long.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Years ago, at a professional development workshop, Ellin Keene poked fun at the creator of the overwrought and overused "Text-to-Self, Text-to-Text, Text-to-World" reading strategy. If you're laughing right now, you know that Ellin is one of the original architects of this strategy, which appears in her groundbreaking book (co-authored with Susan Zimmerman), Mosaic of Thought....

# data[].attributes.headline
Aesthetic & Efferent Reading- Pernille Ripp

# data[].attributes.subject
Aesthetic & Efferent Reading- Pernille Ripp

# data[].attributes.body
Classroom structure that prioritizes time for including both types of reading.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
90 minutes. This glorious amount of time awaits my students and me next year for our English classes. No more trying to cram everything into 45 minutes, no more rushing, no more skipping things. 90 whole minutes, and I cannot help but think of all we can become.

As I plan for these minutes, I realize that once again one of our central tenets will be the right to choose a book and to read it freely every single day. With no post-its, no jots, no interruptions. Just reading for the love of reading, every day, every child, no exceptions. Because if we listen to Louise Rosenblatt, and I don't know why we shouldn't, she reminded us back in 1978 that children need to be taught that there are two types of reading. Aesthetic reading which focuses on the love of reading, on living within texts so that we can create a relationship with the text. On being with the text so that we can see ourselves as readers. And also efferent reading, reading for skill, reading to work on reading. The things we do with what we read.

For many years, it appears that we have focused mostly on the later. The joy of reading has simply not been something we have made room for in our schools as we rush to utilize every single minute for instruction, for skill, for doing something. And we see the direct results now. The PEW Research Center reports that 24% of adults have not read a book in the last 12 months. Scholastic reminds us that fewer and fewer children read a book for fun every day. And we see it in our classrooms as students roll their eyes and tell us that books serve no purpose in their lives. We see it when teachers tell us that they simply don't have time for students to read in class because they have too much to cover.

We have lost our way when it comes to one of the basic premises of what teaching reading is really all about; reading for the love of it. Reading to become a reader who reads without the threat of a grade or the promise of a reward.

We must do better than that.

And so next year, I will start once again with 10 minutes of uninterrupted reading time. 10 minutes where we simply work on loving reading. Where we work on falling into the pages of a book and then staying there. Nothing to do but read. Then a mini-lesson and then we shift focus to the skills of reading. There will be discussion, strategic lessons, small groups, and everything we love about the workshop model. Students will know that they are now working on a different skill than before because it is within this knowledge they can see the difference. They need to know there is a difference.

For too long we have lost too many kids in reading. They have turned away from books because books meant more work. More things to do. More interruptions. More accountability. And while we need students who can apply the skills of reading, we more so need kids who will like reading once they leave us. Who will not become a part of the 24& as we slide toward a more aliterate nation, a more aliterate world. And it starts with the very decisions that we make every single day. Where we look at the precious time we are given and get our priorities straight. It was never about just making sure kids could pass tests, it was always about them becoming more than what they started as. So we have to make room for both types of independent reading. The one where kids "just" read and the one where they work while they read. Otherwise, we will lose them.

It starts with the decisions we are making now as we reflect on the year ahead. Make room for both because we cannot do the work if we don't. And if you don't have the time, make the time. Ask yourself what are you doing with the time? how much time is lost simply in transitions? In bell work? In us teachers talking too much? If we say we want students to become readers then that starts in our classrooms, not when they go home.
If you like what you read here, consider reading my newest book, Passionate Readers - The Art of Reaching and Engaging Every Child Also consider joining our book club study of it, kicking off June 17th. This book focuses on the five keys we can implement into any reading community to strengthen student reading experiences, even within the 45 minute English block. If you are looking for solutions and ideas for how to re-engage all of your students consider reading my very first book Passionate Learners - How to Engage and Empower Your Students. Also, if you are wondering where I will be in the coming year or would like to have me speak, please see this page.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Make Room For Both Types of Independent Reading

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
90 minutes. This glorious amount of time awaits my students and me next year for our English classes. No more trying to cram everything into 45 minutes, no more rushing, no more skipping things. 90 whole minutes, and I cannot help but think of all we can become.

# data[].attributes.body
Surveys, interviews- get to know your students as readers

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
There are certain forms and surveys that I use to prompt conversations, as well as do managerial things with my students. Why not share them? So feel free to modify and make them your own, just make a copy and you can edit them.

Mature Books Permission Slips for Elementary. I used this to get parent approval for students to read YA in my class.

Classroom Library Letter for Parents. This letter is adapted from letters that Kate Messner and Jillian Heise shared and is a letter I send home at the beginning of the year to explain the variety of books in our classroom letters.

Reader Survey. This survey is for my students at the beginning of the year as I try to learn their reading truths.

Reader Identity Profile. This is a vital part of my recordkeeping and helps me get all information straight that my students give me at the beginning of the year. This is a work in progress.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
There are certain forms and surveys that I use to prompt conversations, as well as do managerial things with my students. Why not share them? So feel free to modify and make them your own, just make a copy and you can edit them. Mature Books Permission Slips for Elementary.

# data[].attributes.body
It's ok to stop reading a book. Thoughts on how to guide readers through this in the classroom.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
I have watched her every day, picking up a book, reading, kind of, and then at the end of class casually placing it into the return bin of our classroom. Another book abandoned. Another story given up. In the past, I would have grabbed that book and handed it back to her. " Give it another day or so. This one you're sticking with." But not now. Not anymore.

I used to think that when a child abandoned a book, they simple had not given it enough of a chance. That the act of abandonment was a badge of honor; look at how I am not reading! That they abandoned books because it was a way to not read, after all, you cannot read when you do not have a book.

So I helped them by creating rules... You cannot abandon a book until you are 50 pages in. You can only abandon one book, then the next one you have to read. You must tell me when you abandon a book so we can discuss why. The rules were meant to discourage it, to make abandoning a book a hassle, to inspire students to give the book a proper chance. And they kind of followed them, or I thought they did, until I noticed that the students were no longer abandoning books, instead they were fake reading, getting the timing just right of their meticulous page turns, yet their eyes were not on the page. My helpful rules had thus created a bigger problem; children who would rather sit and do nothing but turn a page rather than read a boring book.

Yet, I now know that book abandonment is a sign of a larger problem. That it is not something most students pride themselves on but instead becomes yet another sign that reading is seemingly not for them. That book abandonment becomes proof of their failures as readers. And the students seem to not know what to do about it. So if teaching 7th graders (and 5th graders, and 4th graders) has taught me anything it is that we have to face it head on. So I had to find a new approach, we had to bring book abandonment into the limelight and embrace it for the reading beast it is. Therefore, in our classroom, we...

Share our own abondenments. I celebrate my book abandoning because it tells the students that I am reader who knows herself. That I am tuned in to my own reading needs to find a book that works for me at that moment. And that those needs change depending on what is going on in my life. Students need an abandonment role model so that the stigma can be removed and the conversations can begin. Because that is what we need; more discussion. More reflection. I never tear a book apart, I instead explain why it is not a great fit for me right now, and then offer it up to others. Most of the time someone grabs it and proves me wrong.

Log it. No, not a reading log, I don't need to know minutes or pages read, but instead a list of books they have finished and books they have abandoned. They have a readers notebook in our classroom that has a section for this so they can easily do it in class. Students need to have a way to examine their own actions, and so the simple sheet with the title on it helps them do just, which leads to the next thing.

Ask why. Assume that all students abandon books, not just the "bad" readers and then ask them why they abandoned that book specifically. Have them examine their own habits so that they can figure out who they are as a reader. My students reflect on their reading habits several times a quarter so that they can see patterns. They look at their list of books they loved and books they didn't so they can get clues to what they like to read, and then start to pay attention to it. They need to study themselves, and be given the time to do so, so they can learn from this rather than just view it as an inevitable part of their reading habits.

Ask "Now what?" Too often our students expect us to come up with the answer, to hand them the next book. I have learned that while we should support their book browsing, we also need to pull back to let them become "Wild readers" as Donalyn Miller says. Readers who know who they are and what they like. So when a child abandons a book and ask me for another recommendation, I ask them to look at their To-Be-Read list, to think for a moment about what they need right now, what their life looks like, and how much energy they have. They then have to find a stack of books to browse through so they can find their next read. They usually let me know at the end what they pick, not because they have to, but because they want to share their find.

Practice total honesty. I ask my students to be completely honest in their reading habits, whether when we speak or when they reflect, because if they are not I cannot help them. They have to trust me to not punish them or somehow degrade their answers. And I don't. Total honesty is paramount to how we work in our classroom. And that starts with me; I do not sugarcoat my own habits. If I did not read the night before they know. If I am dragging in a book, they know. And they also know my reading goals because I set them right alongside them.

Ask probing questions. I will ask a child the harder questions, I will ask them if they are just giving up because they are in a pattern of giving up. I will ask them if they think they should try a few more pages or if they have given it careful thought. That does not mean there are rules for when you abandon, but I do want to make sure that the decision to abandon is one that they know should be carefully considered. That yes, sometimes we know after 1 page that we do not want to read a book, and that is perfectly fine, as long as we know why we don't want to read anymore.

Have an enticing library. Many researchers have solidified the need for incredible classroom libraries, and yes, I know that means that we probably pay for the books out-of-pocket. But it is worth it. Having students be able to immediately try to find another book can be both a blessing and a curse, but in the end, I would rather have a child that is faced with many choices than one who has to wait for a pass or our scheduled time to go to the library to get one.

Creating classrooms where students are passionate about reading, requires many things; a great classroom library, time to read, choice, and also the courage to break some of the rules that surround traditional reading instruction. That includes facing book abandonment head on. What have you tried that has worked?

PS: For ideas on how to get reluctant readers to read, read this.
If you like what you read here, consider reading my book Passionate Learners - How to Engage and Empower Your Students. The 2nd edition and actual book-book (not just e-book!) just came out!

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
I have watched her every day, picking up a book, reading, kind of, and then at the end of class casually placing it into the return bin of our classroom. Another book abandoned. Another story given up. In the past, I would have grabbed that book and handed it back to her.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Traveling librarian spreads enthusiasm for reading

# data[].attributes.body
Scholastic's Ambassador of School Libraries

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Exploring Children’s Literature through Interviews and Book Trailers

# data[].attributes.body
Colby Sharp- 5th grade teacher, author of THE CREATIVITY PROJECT

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
I forgot to make my Happy Saturday video to Mr. Schu yesterday, so I made one this morning. I hope everyone is having a fun and relaxing Sunday!

Happy Saturday, Mr. Schu! It sure was nice hanging out with you at Nerd Camp.

I got a notification on my phone a few minutes ago, saying that Mr. Schu created a Saturday video. That reminded me to make a video. Thanks, Mr. Schu!

Started today with a run and a reading of Dan Santat's After The Fall. Talk about the perfect start to a day!

I had the honor of presenting at the Scholastic Reading Summit yesterday in Chicago. It was fun sharing the story of Parma Elementary with my principal Ms. Haney. My hope is that they found value in what we had to say.

This past school year my students were obsessed with YouTube. Many of them didn't just watch YouTube videos, they also created them. Their passion towards creating content has made me want to spend the summer trying to figure out how I can better serve my students that live in this YouTube world. One thing that I have decided to try is creating more YouTube videos. I've created a lot of videos in the past, but they are mostly just one take videos. It seemed like a good idea to try and make videos like the ones my students are watching. Filming myself playing Minecraft didn't seem like a good idea, so I decided to try and tackle Vlogging. I'm not going to do it every day this summer, but I will do it when I'm doing a lot of school related activities. You can find my two vlogs from the reading summit below.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
I forgot to make my Happy Saturday video to Mr. Schu yesterday, so I made one this morning. I hope everyone is having a fun and relaxing Sunday! Happy Saturday, Mr. Schu! It sure was nice hanging out with you at Nerd Camp.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
I've long said that I am the luckiest librarian around, and you should be aware, this post will do nothing to disprove that claim. All of that said, one of my own personal goals related to this residency was to actively and intentionally reflect on my work there. To that end, and taking inspiration from Colby Sharp, I created
Last summer, I was given the opportunity to spend a year working with the Teacher Librarians and Technology TOSAs (Teachers On Special Assignment) of Evergreen Public Schools in Vancouver, Washington. This residency consisted of spending (just about) one week per month in Vancouver where I got to hang out with the TLs, TOSAs and their students at each school. And then, I prepared and facilitated professional development for the TLs and TOSAs to take place on one of those days, during each of my weekly visits. .
Now that the first year of this residency is over (I'm returning for year two in the fall. Yay!), I've been thinking a lot about the work I've seen, and been a part of, in this mid-sized school district located just across the bridge from Portland, OR. And here are some of my biggest takeaways:

When educators harness the power of their own passions to tackle the expectations of their schools and districts, not only is the work easier and more fun, but that passion often fuels them to achieve more than they ever thought possible. Whether that passion is Star Wars (which middle school TL, Paul Warner, incorporated to just about everything, but most notably his epic sci-fi READcon event where kids, parents and community members gathered to celebrate reading, robotics, comics and everything powered by The Force!) or Pickle Ball (a sport middle school TL, Michelle Arnott, coached in weekly, after school and weekend tournaments, using all the entry fees to fund the most epic and instructionally rich makerspace I've ever seen!) week after week, I saw EPS educators flexing that muscle to make the heavy lifting of their work so much easier. Plus, passion is contagious, y'all. Even if your thing is not their thing, students and teachers will be inspired when you let your geek flag fly.

The primary goal of any district technology dept should be to remove barriers for teachers. I've worked in places where the response to teacher complaints/concerns about technology (think: "my kids can't login" or "if I give students devices, they'll be off task!") were met with irritation and even hostility - which resulted in an adversarial and unhealthy relationship between the technology dept and the teachers on the front lines. Conversely, when teachers in Vancouver expressed concern about how difficult it was for younger students to login to their device, instead of faulting teachers for not taking the time to teach kids how to do it, the tech dept developed an innovative solution involving the student ID cards made available by school picture companies and QR codes. Whether the tech department thought the concern was legitimate or not, they knew that if they removed the obstacle, the more opportunities there would be for students to use technology in meaningful ways. Plus, when teachers feel heard, the more likely they will be to take chances on new technology or be patient when roll-outs don't go exactly as planned.

The root word of personalized (as in personalized learning) is PERSON - not technology! At some point, I will write at length about the "library endorsement' program created by EPS elementary TL Kevin Suenkel, but for now, let me just say it's all about harnessing what students are interested in to create unique learning opportunities that allow them to demonstrate their learning in completely individual ways. Earning some of the endorsements requires students to use technology, while others are completely analog. But wherever the technology is utilized, it's because it makes the learning BETTER. The most important part of this truly personalized learning experience is the learner! The technology is only a tool to help the learner achieve something special.

A fixed schedule does not have to mean a fixed mindset. The elementary TLs in EPS, like most of their colleagues around the country, work in a fixed schedule, seeing back to back, 30 minute, classes on most days. That 30 minutes has to include time for both instruction and book checkout. Obviously, this schedule presents challenges, but everywhere I went, I saw librarians using every single second they had with kids to create meaningful learning opportunities that involved making, building, creating, coding, researching, problem solving and, above all, developing rich reading lives. I had plenty of conversations where these librarians said things like, "can you help me figure out how to do ______ on a fixed schedule?" But I NEVER heard one of them say "I can't do that on a fixed schedule." Ever.

When you lose your way, revisit your why. No school or district is without challenges or areas for growth and EPS is no exception. But by constantly circling back to WHY they chose to be an educators in the first place, these professionals always seem to find the opportunity hidden within every obstacle.

Speaking of great things...#BestPartofMyDay videos, capturing the things I saw each day that inspired me. I started this process at the beginning of my time with EPS and continued to do so every week I was there. I've written before about how powerful this process was for me, so I'll simply say here that as someone who hates to have her photo taken and who struggles to see herself on screen, making these videos was personally challenging, but oh so worth it. Not only did it force to me to take stock of my day and consider which part landed at the top of the awesome pile, but as a result, I learned something important about expectations: when you go into each day looking for great things, you tend to find them.
I've been wanting to write about the last professional development day I got to spend with the TLs of Evergreen Public Schools, and now seems like a good time. I had several goals for the session, which were:

1. To create a stress relieving learning opportunity (the end of the year is fraught with more than enough stress creating opportunities - end of year testing, inventory, etc).

2. To create a session that included at least one strategy they could take back and use immediately.

3. To use a picture book to spark meaningful conversation.

4. To share the concept of a library "vision board."

5. To create an opportunity for revisiting the WHY of our work. And...

So here's what we did....

Step 1: In small groups, the TLs read Alma and How She Got Her Name by Juana Martinez-Neal. Then, together, they discussed what Alma learned about herself by thinking about her name, the people who share (at least part of) her name, and what those namesakes contributed to the world. Step 2: Then,I asked them to individually reflect on the title of "teacher librarian" and what that name meant to them. I asked them to think about the teacher librarians who came before them and what they've contributed to their schools, districts and the world. And I asked them to reflect on why they decided they wanted Teacher Librarian to appear on their own name badge and how THEIR contributions will be different from previous TLs.
Step 3: Next, I gave them a few minutes to individually explore the resources curated on this "TL Vision Board" Padlet - where I've curated articles/posts about why the work of the teacher librarian is so important. While they explored, I encouraged them to jot down some quotes, ideas or take-aways that stood out to them or related to their core beliefs as a teacher librarian. ​

Step 4: After that, using the conversations they'd had with their group about Alma, their own reflections about what it means to be a TL and their notes from exploring the TL Vision Board Padlet, we then created Thumbprint Biographies/Poems that captured who they are as Librarians. If you're not familiar with these, checkout this awesome post from teacher Julie Ballew. Now, I'll admit, this process got a little messy. And some folks were a little uncomfortable. But, we plowed forward, breaking out the stamp pads and markers as well as more paper when a few of us needed a "do over."

Step 5: I then had the TLs share their masterpieces using a shared google slide deck, which I then downloaded as a PDF and then uploaded to the online tool AnyFlip to create this flipping book anthology of their work. (You can checkout their final products by clicking the image below).

To say that I was thrilled with the results would be an understatement. As always, these educators blew me away with their thoughtful and inspiring work! Just like real thumbprints, each biography/poem is unique and I'm in love with some of the different ways they each chose to express their passion for our work. But also, at this time of year, especially, my heart swelled to hear their laughter and camaraderie. All points in the school year have their challenges, but the end of the year... y'all. It's tough. When you've got an opportunity to let me people laugh and make stuff, take it.

That said, if you're interested in recreating this professional development with your learners (of any age), In fact, not that long ago, I had a conversation with a TL from another district who told me she felt that elementary and secondary libraries had very different missions. I can't remember how I responded at the time, but I've been thinking about her assertion ever since. And the more I think about it, the more I respectfully disagree. At their heart, I think here's a link to the site I used with EPS on that day. Have fun!
Finally, I'd probably be remiss if I didn't share my own messy and imperfect thumbprint biography as a part of this post. I created a sample version as part of the PD and found the process fun and meaningful, in large part because it required me to really think about what I believe as a librarian - something I think about a lot, actually.
all libraries share the same mission: to change the world by 1) being democratizing forces in their schools/communities - places where anyone, regardless of their race, religion, income, gender/identity, sexual orientation, ability, etc., can access the same information. And by 2) connecting people to lives that are informed and inspired by story. While I do think the WAYS in which elementary and secondary librarians go about achieving those goals vary greatly, the mission remains the same. And when you spend a little time immersed in that mission and in what it means to do this kind of work, particularly at this point in history, the weight of it lingers. This work. It matters, y'all.
So, keep on. Won't you?

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
I've long said that I am the luckiest librarian around, and you should be aware, this post will do nothing to disprove that claim. All of that said, one of my own personal goals related to this residency was to actively and intentionally reflect on my work there.

# data[].attributes.headline
Research on why independent reading matters

# data[].attributes.subject
Research on why independent reading matters

# data[].attributes.body
Does anyone ask the band teacher why the kids are playing their instruments in class?

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
I’ve Got Research. Yes, I Do. I’ve Got Research. How About You?

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
In 1847, Hungarian doctor, Ignaz Semmelweis made a remarkable discovery. When doctors washed their hands in a solution of chlorine and water, childbirth fever rates at Vienna General Hospital dropp…

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Highlighting the need to improve literacy rates and provide access to educational opportunities for all children, LitWorld will host the third annual World Read Aloud Day on March 7, 2012. Last year, World Read Aloud Day united 200,000 people in 60 countries. Show your public support for this important literacy initiative and promote reading in local and global communities by participating in World Read Aloud Day. Suggested activities and other resources are available on LitWorld's website.

World Read Aloud Day embraces the power of words to bring people together, and I witness this power first hand when my students gather for our daily read aloud.

Listening to Sharon Draper's Out of My Mind during the last ten minutes of class, my students hang on every word. They are fascinated with Melody's story about her life with cerebral palsy and her struggle for acceptance and understanding.

Every day, Sam accuses me of torturing him, marveling at my ability to stop at a cliffhanger moment, close the book, and dismiss the class.

He asks, "Did you learn how to do that at teacher school, Mrs. Miller? How do you always know when to stop at the most suspenseful part?"

I love that Sam and my other students enjoy our read aloud time so much that they groan when it's over for the day.

Instructionally, reading aloud books, poems, articles, and short stories to students gives teachers endless opportunities to highlight great writing and model reading strategies, but reading aloud provides other benefits to young readers.

Reading aloud builds community. Shared experiences create memories that connect us to each other. Reading aloud books with children offers these unifying moments. While reading together, we laugh and cry together, comrades on the same journey. My students are a reading community, bonded to each other through the books we have shared, and these connections last long after the book ends.

Reading aloud exposes children to books, authors, or genres they might not discover on their own. When choosing books to read aloud, I often pick books with the goal of leading my students to more books they can read on their own. Perennial favorites include authors like Gary Paulsen, Gordon Korman, Deborah Wiles, and Tom Angleberger. Students beg me for more books by authors I introduce during read alouds.

Read alouds are perfect opportunities to expose students to genres they often avoid like poetry, biographies and nonfiction, too. After discovering books they enjoy first through read alouds, children are more receptive to reading more books from these genres. You don't have to read the entire book to entice readers, either. Frequently, I will read the first chapter, article, or poem from a book and place it on the marker rail. The book rarely lasts until the end of the day before an eager reader claims it.

Reading aloud supports developing readers. Realistically, no book fits every reader. Reading aloud removes roadblocks to comprehension like unfamiliar vocabulary and contextualizes words developing readers do not know. Listening to a fluent reader gives students a reading role model for their own oral reading skills, too. Since listening comprehension is higher than reading comprehension, you can read books that are a higher reading level than your students can read alone.
Reading aloud reminds children why they love reading. Sitting on your lap, encircled by love and warmth, these are our children's first reading memories. Reading aloud reminds children that reading is pleasurable, an activity they enjoyed before reading turned into an academic chore. For students who lack positive reading experiences, read alouds are a marvelous way to introduce them to reading for pleasure.

Consider the following read alouds for your upper elementary students (4th -6th grades). Each book introduces students to a series or author they can continue reading.

100 Cupboards by N.D. Wilson (fantasy)

BookSpeak! Poems about Books by Laura Purdie Salas (poetry)

Countdown by Deborah Wiles (historical fiction)

Hound Dog True by Linda Urban (realistic fiction)

Knucklehead: Tall Tales and Almost True Stories of Growing Up Scieszka by Jon Scieszka (memoir)

My Life in Dog Years by Gary Paulsen (memoir)

NERDS: National Espionage, Rescue, and Defense Society by Michael Buckley (science fiction)

Out of My Mind by Sharon Draper (realistic fiction)

Peaceful Pieces: Poems and Quilts about Peace by Anna Grossnickle Hines (poetry)

The Strange Case of Origami Yoda by Tom Angleberger (realistic fiction)

Titanic by Gordon Korman (historical fiction)

Winterling by Sarah Prineas (fantasy)

You have special read alouds, too--books from your childhood and books you read with your own children and students. Share your favorite read alouds in the comments, so we can add your favorites to our lists.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Highlighting the need to improve literacy rates and provide access to educational opportunities for all children, LitWorld will host the third annual World Read Aloud Day on March 7, 2012. Last year, World Read Aloud Day united 200,000 people in 60 countries.

# data[].attributes.body
Thoughts on reading instruction for standardized test pre

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Testing season is upon us and in many classrooms the pressure to assure all students pass minimum proficiency on standardized tests overwhelms teachers and reduces meaningful teaching to test prep. According to Richard Allington in What Really Matters for Struggling Readers: Designing Research-Based Programs:

Test preparation might produce a small benefit if it works to ensure students are familiar with the test format, but too much practice on formats produces careless errors. The best guideline for test preparation would seem to be to practice a couple of days before the test to familiarize students with the test format and to introduce or review, general test-taking strategies. But daily periods of test preparation across the school year seems more likely to result in lower performances because most test preparation involves little, if any, teaching of useful reading strategies or development of world knowledge (Allington, 2006, 23-24).

While there is no research to support that test prep improves students' reading ability or standardized test performance, extensive test practice and the teaching of test-taking strategies continue to replace or subvert quality reading instruction in some schools. I encourage you to revisit this post, which appeared in February of 2008, as a reminder of why we teach and where our responsibilities lie-- with the young readers we serve.

Primum non nocere- "First do no harm". This tenet of the medical profession reminds doctors to consider the negative consequences of any medical intervention alongside the advantages. Quality of life for the patient overrides the good intentions of any course of treatment even if there are perceived benefits. I believe that the teaching profession needs this lesson as much as doctors do.

Young children love to read, or at least be read to. The most dormant sixth graders in my classes can recall a book they have loved, even if it was Green Eggs and Ham. Following years of schooling, this book love goes away for many kids. Those of us who are charged with teaching students to read claim not to understand why this love for reading and books go away, but I secretly (OK, not so secretly, now) suspect that we do know. The manner in which schools institutionalize reading takes this love away from children.

What does reading look like for you? For me, reading is not just something I do; being a reader is who I am. In many ways, being a reader has defined my life. I married a reader, hang out with other readers, and have dedicated my professional life to working with children as a reading teacher.

Not only am I a passionate reader, I am a great test taker, too. I can dissect tests on topics that I do not know that much about (check out my GRE scores) in large part because I am a great reader. But, let's not put the cart before the horse, I am good test-taker because I am a good reader; I am not a good reader because I am good test-taker.

Standardized reading test season has descended on classrooms, and the reading instruction in many has narrowed to a handful of test-taking tricks drilled into students day in and day out in a monotonous stream of acronyms, chants, and tricks labeled as strategies. Make no mistake about it, no matter what we proclaim to our students about book love the rest of the year, this is the message they get from us about what reading is. As instruction becomes limited to test-taking drill and kill, we are slowly strangling the joy of reading out of students, and without quality instruction in how to read well, we are narrowing their possibilities as readers forever.

Are there any teachers in the world who truly, with all of their hearts, believe that they are creating lifelong readers with all of this drill? The ugly truth is we know we aren't, but we are doing what our administrators, parents, and legislators expect from us-- get students to pass the test, the test, the test. If our students don't ever pick up a book again after graduation, it is not our fault.

What we fail to accept is that those students who grew to love reading in spite of us still do better on these tests than all of the kids who endured years of reading instruction by highlighter, but never really read. Avid "I cannot wait to get my hands on a book" readers outstrip their peers on every test, every time.

Isn't this what students should learn from us about reading?

It is an ethical issue, not just an educational one. Children trust us and deserve more.

So, first, do no harm. Do not take away that love of reading in the name of the greater good (Good for whom?). It ultimately kills. It kills children's love of reading for all of their lives.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Testing season is upon us and in many classrooms the pressure to assure all students pass minimum proficiency on standardized tests overwhelms teachers and reduces meaningful teaching to test prep.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
© 2012 paulwhankins
This is a quick response having been moved by Kylene Beers's blog from July 21st, "Lexile, Move Over." Here's to more happy endings as our readers come to terms-and at times come face-to-face-with this place. . .or is it a thing. . .called "the lex-aisle?" Before you read today's post, I want to take a moment to thank everyone who has dropped by this week to add a comment, to share the blog with a friend or a follower at Facebook or Twitter, or to just drop a line of encouragement. Thank you! Really. From the bottom of my heart. I really appreciate your kind words and shares!
"Lamentations from the Lex-aisle"

I spotted a small reader,

and I watched him for a while,

when he turned to me with an impish grin

and asked, "Do you know where is the lex-aisle?"

Now, I'm not that kind of teacher,

diagramming sentences in my head,

but I used my descriptionist sensibilities

to decipher what he'd said.

What's a 'lex-aisle?' I asked the child,

sensing where this may lead,

and the small reader responded,

"Well. . .it has the books that I should read.

My teacher says if I keep reading,

I might get even stronger;

I'd like this one here 'bout tree frogs,

but I have to read one longer.

Oh!, he exclaimed, this one's about mummies!

I've seen them on a t.v. show.

Cool cover! Look at these pictures!

This book has everything I need to know!

But we don't read about mummies;

they're not on our reading list,

so, if you'll just take me to the lex-aisle,

we'll just get on with this."

Have you tried these kinds of books?

I asked with the covers facing up.

"Oh!" he said, "I tried reading those in class one day

and the teacher said it was 'time to grow up.'

So, I don't look at those books no more, Mister.

That one looks cool, though-the one with the reptile-

but my summer break is almost over,

and we've been here quite a while."

I could tell this wouldn't be easy;

there were obstacles in the way.

It seemed the "lex-aisle" would come out on top

no matter what I might say.

So there we stood among the books, we too,

I, trying desperately to remember,

what a lexile even was,

I think I knew. . .one September.

So, I asked one more question,

in the hope I might assist,

I am a reader, after all,

and book talking? I can't resist.

How important is this "lex-aisle," lad?

Do you really need it to read a book?

And his lip started to quiver and I heard a sniffle.

Oh, dear, I knew this look. . .

"My friends all read different books than me," he said,

they get to go out in the hall.

But, sometimes, when I read a book,

I don't get the words at all.

I thought finding something from the lex-aisle,

would help me, as teacher said, 'to be stronger.'

But, I've been wrong before, so I guess

I can be even wronger.

I'm just coming from Summer school.

I've been there all Summer long,

My friends all say that Summer School's

where kids like me belong.

And I appreciate your helping me, Mister;

you've created quite a pile.

But, if it's all the same, I guess

I'll just go ahead and wait a while.

You're awfully nice, Mister,

and your books all look so cool,

but I can tell you don't know one thing

about what it's like at school.

You have to read every page in the book

and then you take a test.

If you get all the questions right

you just might be the best.

They put stars on the walls for the books you read

Some kids look like the galaxy,

but the lone star on the bulletin board,

yep, that one's bright-shiny-nothing, me.

At the end of the year, there's a party.

I've have gone if I could,

Even if they let me go-with just one book,

I'll bet that pizza wouldn't taste so good.

My friend, Tommy, read fifty books!

Top reader! Every book they had!

I read one book about motorcycles.

He won a bike. I felt bad.

So, you see, Mister. That's reading. For real.

But you don't know how to play the game.

But you sure like your books. I can tell.

And I thank you just the same."

And he scampered off as young lads do,

to another part of the store.

I stood there with those books in my hands

looking at the ones spread out on the floor.

But I do know about reading, I thought.

I do and I know more.

But for today,

it's "lex-aisle" one and reader none.

Now, how's that for a score?

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
© 2012 paulwhankins This is a quick response having been moved by Kylene Beers's blog from July 21st, "Lexile, Move Over. " Here's to more happy endings as our readers come to terms-and at times come face-to-face-with this place. . .or is it a thing. . .called "the lex-aisle?"

# data[].attributes.body
What happens when we insist that kids only read texts according to Lexile level

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
What do Jeff Kinney's popular Diary of a Wimpy Kid and Ray Bradbury's classic Fahrenheit 451 have in common? What about Gossip Girl: A Novel, Cicely von Ziegesar's catty romance and The Great Gilly Hopkins, Katherine Paterson's 1979 Newbery Honor book? While clear distinctions exist between each book's literary merit, age appropriateness, and reader appeal, these titles possess one similarity--they sit within the same Lexile text complexity band.**

Well-meaning educators, concerned about increasing text complexity and reading rigor, engage in this game of "Guess My Lexile" when denouncing the low-reading level of young adult literature, elevating certain titles over others, or dictating book purchases and recommended reading lists. But looking at just a few examples reveals problems when narrowly evaluating texts by readability number alone.

The Lexile Framework for Reading by Metametrix provides quantitative assessment of both students' reading levels and texts' complexity. Students receive a Lexile measure from certain reading tests. Books and other texts receive a Lexile measure from a software tool, the Lexile Analyzer, which evaluates word frequency and sentence length. Many schools use Lexile measures to assess students' reading levels and match students with appropriately rigorous reading material.

I have no issue with assessing students' reading levels and identifying text complexity. As a teacher, I find such information helpful when determining my students' reading ability and what books might fit them. What concerns me is that in many situations, Lexile measures become the sole factor in book selection and recommendation.

While identifying readability can be useful when evaluating textbooks, guided reading texts, or other teaching materials, selecting books for classroom instruction and recommending books for independent reading are two different processes. Avid readers do not always read at the edge of their competence, traveling through increasingly more difficult texts as leveling systems proscribe (Carter, 2000). Given free choice, readers select reading material according to their interests, preferences, background knowledge, purposes for reading, and personal motivation.

I hear horror stories about teachers and librarians rigidly enforcing Lexile bands--preventing children from reading books that aren't at their Lexile level: Students can't read an entire series because every book isn't at their Lexile. Students can't use sections of school and classroom libraries because the books are too easy or too hard (according to Lexile measures). Parents receive Lexile reading lists for their children with strict instructions to exclusively use these lists when purchasing books.

In cynical moments, I picture a Lexile store selling tattoo kits, so over-zealous educators can brand students with their Lexiles. Wouldn't this make trips to the library easier for everyone?

Investigating Lexile measures further, imagine my surprise when I found this information on Metametrix's website:

"Many other factors affect the relationship between a reader and a book, including its content, the age and interests of the reader, and the design of the actual book. The Lexile text measure is a good starting point in the book-selection process, with these other factors then being considered."

Addressing questions such as, "What do Lexile measures tell me about grade appropriateness?" "Why do some great books have low Lexile measures?" and "What is the relationship between grade equivalents and Lexile measures?" I found several informative videos and researched-based responses on Metametrix's website, which reinforce that Lexile measures do not tell us everything we need to know about texts or students. With Lexile measures touted as a key indicator of text complexity as defined by Common Core State Standards, we must critically consider what Lexile bands offer teachers and students, and what they don't.

Overreliance on reading level systems hinders children from learning how to self-select books. Bookstores, libraries, and Grandma's bookshelf aren't leveled. Beyond students' and books' reading levels, we must consider content and interests when selecting materials and recommending books for independent reading. Slavish devotion to numbers doesn't benefit readers.

Is this practice employed because it's better for kids or just easier for adults? What about children who find their reading experiences limited when Lexile numbers dictate their book access and choices? Looking at a child's face or a book's cover, I see possibility, not a number.We can't shortcut or disregard knowing books, knowing readers, and building connections between them.

Reading leveling systems like Lexile, DRA, and Guided Reading provide teachers and librarians with one measure for making book recommendations and supporting students as they self-select books, but children shouldn't wear their reading levels like a badge and become defined by them.

Do we teach children how to preview and evaluate books for themselves or teach them that reading and book selection belong to school and we can't trust them with it?

For additional commentary about Lexile, reading level systems, and text complexity:

" The Lexile Framework: Unnecessary and Potentially Harmful " by Dr. Stephen Krashen

From ASCD's Educational Leadership, " The Challenge of Challenging Texts " by Timothy Shanahan, Douglas Fisher, and Nancy Frey

" Lamentations from the Lex-aisle " by Paul W. Hankins

From School Library Journal, " Formula for Failure: Reading Levels and Readability Formulas Do Not Create Lifelong Readers " by Betty Carter

**According to Titlewave:
The Diary of a Wimpy Kid 950
Fahrenheit 451 890
Gossip Girl 820
The Great Gilly Hopkins 800

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
What do Jeff Kinney's popular Diary of a Wimpy Kid and Ray Bradbury's classic Fahrenheit 451 have in common? What about Gossip Girl: A Novel, Cicely von Ziegesar's catty romance and The Great Gilly Hopkins, Katherine Paterson's 1979 Newbery Honor book?

# data[].attributes.body
thoughts on reading levels

# data[].attributes.headline
PSYCHOLOGY TODAY- 3 MYTHS OF READING LEVELS

# data[].attributes.subject
PSYCHOLOGY TODAY- 3 MYTHS OF READING LEVELS

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Psychologists love to measure things, and perhaps nothing has been measured as much by psychologists as reading-both texts and readers. Multiple different instruments measuring text readability have been devised and used over the past century, as have multiple standardized tests of readers' abilities. Though their results are often first presented as numerical scores whose interpretation is difficult without a key, most instruments also translate these into more generally understood grade-level reading scores. These are typically reported as year-and-month scores; thus a book scoring at reading level 8.1 is said to be written at the early eighth-grade level, while a student scoring at reading level 4.6 is judged to be reading at the level of the average student in the sixth month of fourth grade. Two common reading level systems are exceptions to this: Fountas and Pinnell's Guided Reading program uses letters, from A to Z, while the increasingly popular Lexile leveling scheme rates both texts and readers from 0L to approximately 2000L (there is actually no upper limit). Both of these do, however, offer rough grade level conversion charts on their websites, here and here respectively.

However measured, reading levels can be a generally useful guide to whether a particular text is going to be far too difficult for a particular reader. For example, the student who scored at 4.6 on a recent, valid reading test will probably have significant difficulty reading and understanding that text at an 8.1 reading level.

Unfortunately, though, the ubiquity and precision with which these reading levels are now being tested and reported has led to their increasingly inappropriate use, especially in schools. For example, professional development materials accompanying the Common Core initiative instruct teachers to "match" texts to readers based on Lexile level, staying within a narrow range of only 50L above to 100L below each student's tested Lexile level. Most school reading incentive programs require students to read texts within a restricted range of their measured reading skill levels, either within the Lexile range just mentioned, or, if using another rating system, within five months of their measured reading levels. For example, that student who tested at 4.6 might only receive credit for reading books leveled from 4.1 to 5.1. Many schools now even restrict the books students can check out from the school library to those at such "appropriate" levels, and in some cases, parents are even being told to " concentrate on material within his or her Lexile range " when offering books to their children at home.

Such misguided policies and practices are based on three very prevalent myths about reading levels:
Myth #1: Each text has a discrete, accurately measurable reading level.
Because reading levels are often reported very precisely, one might think that measuring the readability of a text was an exact, agreed upon science. Nothing could be further from the truth. Almost all text level measures are based upon some combination of word difficulty (measured by number of letters, number of syllables, and/or frequency of use) and sentence complexity (measured by length in words and/or number of phrases). However, the specific formulas and differing emphases of various measures can result in very different reading levels for a single text.

Take, for example, the 2016 Newbery Medal book, The Girl Who Drank the Moon by Kelly Barnhill. The Lexile corporation rates this award-winning book for young teens at 640L, equivalent to somewhere between a 3rd and 5th grade reading level, according to their conversion tables. ATOS, the reading level system used by the Accelerated Reader program, rates it at reading level 4.8 (i.e., 4th grade, 8th month). Using the first 200 words from Chapter 2 of the book, the Free Readability Calculator results in the following range of levels, from seven more of the best known and respected readability scales, for exactly the same words from the same book:

Automated Readability Index: RL 5.6

The SMOG Index: RL 5.8

Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level: RL 5.8

Linsear Write Formula: RL 6.6

Dale-Chall Formula: RL 6.9

Gunning Fog Index: RL 7.6

The Coleman-Liau Index: RL 8.0

That readability scores for this book, based on well-accepted, research-based formulas, span more than three grade levels is not an unusual result; try it for yourself using 150 words or more from any text. And of course, none of these scales can measure how well the text is actually written-whether the author uses transitions effectively, provides rich descriptions, or explains things clearly, all of which certainly affect the readability of a text.
Myth #2: Each reader has a discrete, accurately measurable level of reading skill.
Tests of reading skill levels, even those that are carefully designed and commonly used, suffer from many of the same difficulties as measures of text readability, in that each uses differing contents and criteria for measuring reading ability.

Some use lists of common words at differing grade levels to judge decoding ability, while others require readers to pronounce a list of nonsense words as well. Some include measures of oral reading fluency and/or vocabulary, while others do not. Some tests ask readers to answer questions after reading a passage, while others measure comprehension through a CLOZE procedure in which readers are asked to supply missing words in a passage, and still others require readers to recall salient details of a text as a means of judging comprehension. Some tests are given by a trained psychologist, one-on-one, while others are given to groups of students in regular class settings. Some are timed, while others are not.

Even the very criterion for scoring "at" a certain reading level differs among tests, with some tests allowing readers to attempt all the test questions (or as many as they have time for), and then scoring based on the number of correct answers, while others subtract a certain percentage of incorrect answers from the number of correct answers before scoring, and still others arrive at a reading level by stopping the test after the reader has missed a certain set number of questions.

Not surprisingly, readers will often score quite differently on different reading tests.

In addition, while texts stay the same from day to day, readers do not. People's performance on many tasks, including reading tests, can be significantly affected by whether they are tired or well-rested, hungry or full, healthy or sick, distracted or focused, anxious or confident. Children are perhaps even more affected by such outer circumstances, since they lack the maturation and self-regulation skills that allow many adults to maintain more even performance levels in varying circumstances.

Myth #3: Readers should (almost always) read texts very near their reading level.

Given the margins of error implied by the variability in both text readability and reading skill measurement described above, the expectation that texts can be closely "matched" to readers' skill levels is clearly unfounded. The idea that texts should always be matched to readers' tested levels is equally problematic, for a number of reasons.

First, reading is an interactive process, so the difficulty or ease with which a particular reader can read a particular text depends in part on his or her prior knowledge related to the text and motivation for reading it.

Reading research has repeatedly demonstrated the effects of prior knowledge on reading comprehension; simply put, it is easier to read and understand texts that talk about things you already know a lot about. When readers have a good bit of prior knowledge on a topic, even difficult texts can be easier to read and understand because they can draw on their own knowledge to fill in any gaps in their comprehension. Conversely, many of us have experienced the effects of a lack of prior knowledge when first reading in an unfamiliar subject area, whether it is economics or art or environmental science. It is not so much that we cannot read or do not know the words in the texts, as it is that we don't have the background knowledge to make sense of what they say. Similarly, readers demonstrate higher "reading levels" in genres that are familiar to them. For example, a complex science fiction novel, very difficult to read for someone who rarely reads in that genre, may be considerably less difficult for a frequent science fiction reader, who is familiar with common science fiction conventions and story lines, and perhaps even with previous books by the same author.

Interest and motivation also great affect a reader's ability to read a text. An excellent example of this is the recent Harry Potter phenomenon, in which thousands of children as young as second grade read and enjoyed 300 and 400 page books written at fifth to seventh-grade reading levels, simply because they were fascinated by the magical world created by J.K. Rowling in her series. Most teachers can likewise recount stories of students like the struggling high school reader who tests at a fourth or fifth-grade reading level, but somehow manages to read and understand a motorcycle repair manual written at the tenth-grade level, because he wants to fix up his motorcycle. And of course, resources can be made available to help truly motivated readers read difficult texts, from dictionaries, online resources, and audio texts to the time-honored strategy of simply asking someone else, a teacher, parent, sibling, or friend, about the words you don't know. We might also point out here that most very early simple books (those with highly repetitive text) simply cannot give children a full sense of the joy of reading.

Also, there is good evidence for the benefits of reading texts both above and below one's official reading level. Reading easier texts can help novice readers, especially, gain fluency and confidence, and can develop readers' enjoyment of reading at all levels. Consider how many of us enjoy relaxing with a good romance or murder mystery that is well below our adult "reading level"! On the other hand, researchers are finding that challenging students to tackle more complex texts, while supporting them in their efforts to do so, leads to greater growth in reading than simply having them read texts at or just above their current reading levels.

Finally, full comprehension is not necessary for a reader to enjoy and benefit from a book. Certainly students should not be assigned and required to learn from a book that is significantly too difficult for them to read, but most of us, again, remember reading and enjoying in childhood books like The Secret Garden or A Christmas Carol or Captains Courageous without, at first, fully understanding the historical contexts or social issues involved. Indeed, it is often as we grow, and read and then reread such books, that we first gain a sense of history or start to value equality or self-reliance or charity, from stories and characters we have grown to love.
Some take-aways:
Reading levels should never be used to limit the texts children may access or try to read. Neither reading tests nor readability measures are anywhere near exact enough to predict which individual child will best be able to read or benefit from which individual book or magazine or online text. There is nothing wrong with letting a child try to read a text, and then abandon it if it is too hard, or too simplistic, or simply boring-after all, adults do this all the time. Limiting reading selections based on reading levels too often results in children having too few texts available to them that they want to read, and thus discourages them from reading altogether.

Passion, curiosity, and knowledge are at least as important as reading levels in helping children find good things to read. This is especially true because we know that motivation and knowledge can increase effective reading levels, while, conversely, readers can enjoy and gain a lot from texts that interest them, even if they are "too easy."

Children should not be required/expected to independently read and learn from texts that are considerably above their reading levels. Ironically, textbooks are perhaps the most common source of such demands, since they are frequently written well above the reading levels of the grades for which they are intended. But disparity between student reading levels and text readability levels does not necessarily mean we should discourage or prevent such students from engaging with such texts. Rather, it should trigger educators to provide support for reading as necessary, including vocabulary- and knowledge-building tools, partner reading, group discussions, audio- and video-texts, and simple availability for questions. Indeed, since reading levels are not exact measures, and also affected by prior knowledge and interest, such supports will probably be helpful to many other students as well.

To read more about this topic, check out these clear, but nuanced discussions of readability and leveled reading by top researchers in this field:

Hiebert, E. H. (2012). Readability and the Common Core's staircase of text complexity. Retrieved from http://ransonbalancedliteracy.cmswiki.wikispaces.net/file/view/Text-Matters_Readability-and-Complexity.pdf

Shanahan, T. (2011). Rejecting instructional level theory. Retrieved from http://www.shanahanonliteracy.com/2011/08/rejecting-instructional-level-...

Benjamin, R. G. (2012). Reconstructing readability: Recent developments and recommendations in the analysis of text difficulty. Educational Psychology Review, 24(1), 63-88.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Psychologists love to measure things, and perhaps nothing has been measured as much by psychologists as reading-both texts and readers. Multiple different instruments measuring text readability have been devised and used over the past century, as have multiple standardized tests of readers' abilities.

# data[].attributes.body
Increasing kids' access to books

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
I have been blogging, writing, and talking about children's independent reading lives for over ten years-starting with my first Ask the Mentor column for Education Week Teacher in 2007. I am not the first or the last educator to take on this topic. Scores of literacy leaders, like Daniel Fader, Rudine Sims-Bishop, Stephen Krashen, Teri...

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
It's not easy to create an inclusive book collection. Whether you're a librarian creating a collection for an entire community, a teacher creating a collection for your classroom, or a parent creating a collection for your children, choosing books that reflect the diversity of human experience can be a challenging job.

That's because creating a diverse book collection is about more than just making sure X, Y, and Z are represented. It's not a matter of ticking off check boxes or making sure quotas are filled. For those committed to doing it right, building a diverse book collection requires contemplation, research, and awareness. But the rewards are great: a truly diverse collection of books can turn children into lifelong readers and promote empathy, understanding, and self-confidence.

To make things a little easier, we've created a checklist to help.
Here are eight steps to all-inclusive reading:

1. Does your book list or collection include books with characters of color? LGBTQ? Differently-abled?

2. Does it include books with a main character of color? LGBTQ? Differently-abled?

3. Does it include books written or illustrated by a person of color? Of different nationalities, religions or sexual preference?

4. Are there any books with a person of color on the cover? Do the characters on the book covers accurately reflect the characters in the book?

5. Think about your student population. Does your list provide a mix of "mirror" books and "window" books for your students-books in which they can see themselves reflected and books in which they can learn about others?

6. Think about the subject matter of your diverse books. Do all your books featuring black characters focus on slavery? Do all your books about Latino characters focus on immigration? Are all your LGBTQ books coming out stories?

7. Do you have any books featuring diverse characters that are not primarily about race or prejudice?

8. Consider your classic books, both fiction and nonfiction. Do any contain hurtful racial or ethnic stereotypes , or images (e.g. Little House on the Prairie or The Indian in the Cupboard)? If so, how will you address those stereotypes with students? Have you included another book that provides a more accurate depiction of the same culture?

If the answer to any of these questions is no, here are some resources that can help:
Where can I find great diverse children's books? A resource list Beyond Good Intentions: Selecting Multicultural Literature Seven Ways to Explore Race in the Classroom How inclusive is my classroom library? A Toolkit Disability in KidLit I'm Here, I'm Queer, What the Hell Do I Read? American Indians in Children's Literature Diversity in YA
What questions would you add? What resources would you recommend? As always, leave 'em in the comments!

*Many thanks to librarian Edith Campbell for her corrections and feedback on our list!

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Checklist: 8 Steps to Creating a Diverse Book Collection

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
It's not easy to create an inclusive book collection. Whether you're a librarian creating a collection for an entire community, a teacher creating a collection for your classroom, or a parent creating a collection for your children, choosing books that reflect the diversity of human experience can be a challenging job.

# data[].attributes.headline
Communicate with parents about the importance of independent reading

# data[].attributes.subject
Communicate with parents about the importance of independent reading

# data[].attributes.body
INFO FOR FAMILIES

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Whether rich or poor, residents of the United States or China, illiterate or college graduates, parents who have books in the home increase the level of education their children will attain, according to a 20-year study led by Mariah Evans, University of Nevada, Reno associate professor of sociology and resource economics.

For years, educators have thought the strongest predictor of attaining high levels of education was having parents who were highly educated. But, strikingly, this massive study showed that the difference between being raised in a bookless home compared to being raised in a home with a 500-book library has as great an effect on the level of education a child will attain as having parents who are barely literate (3 years of education) compared to having parents who have a university education (15 or 16 years of education). Both factors, having a 500-book library or having university-educated parents, propel a child 3.2 years further in education, on average.

Being a sociologist, Evans was particularly interested to find that children of lesser-educated parents benefit the most from having books in the home. She has been looking for ways to help Nevada's rural communities, in terms of economic development and education.

"What kinds of investments should we be making to help these kids get ahead?" she asked. "The results of this study indicate that getting some books into their homes is an inexpensive way that we can help these children succeed."

Evans said, "Even a little bit goes a long way," in terms of the number of books in a home. Having as few as 20 books in the home still has a significant impact on propelling a child to a higher level of education, and the more books you add, the greater the benefit.

"You get a lot of 'bang for your book'," she said. "It's quite a good return-on-investment in a time of scarce resources."

In some countries, such as China, having 500 or more books in the home propels children 6.6 years further in their education. In the United States, the effect is less, 2.4 years, than the 3.2-year average advantage experienced across all 27 countries in the study. But, Evans points out that 2.4 years is still a significant advantage in terms of educational attainment.

For example, according to the U.S. Census Bureau's American Community Survey, Americans who have some college or an associate's degree, but not a bachelor's degree, earn an average of $7,213 more annually than those with just a high school education. Those who attain a bachelor's degree earn $21,185 more each year, on average, than those with just high school diplomas.

The study by Evans and her colleagues at Nevada, UCLA and Australian National University is one of the largest and most comprehensive studies ever conducted on what influences the level of education a child will attain.

The researchers were struck by the strong effect having books in the home had on children's educational attainment even above and beyond such factors as education level of the parents, the country's GDP, the father's occupation or the political system of the country.

Having books in the home is twice as important as the father's education level, and more important than whether a child was reared in China or the United States. Surprisingly, the difference in educational attainment for children born in the United States and children born in China was just 2 years, less than two-thirds the effect that having 500 or more books in the home had on children (3.2 years).

The study, "Family scholarly culture and educational success: Books and schooling in 27 nations," was published in the journal, Research in Social Stratification and Mobility ( Science Direct).

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Books in the home as important as parents' education level

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Whether rich or poor, residents of the United States or China, illiterate or college graduates, parents who have books in the home increase the level of education their children will attain, according to a 20-year study led by Mariah Evans, University of Nevada, Reno associate professor of sociology and resource economics.